After my Laurea in Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Technology at the University of Florence (full marks with honors), I worked until 1989 at the Menarini Pharmaceutical Industries Riunite srl, Florence, as researcher for the development of analytical methods for the quality control of drugs being tested.
I’m now Full Professor of Chemistry at the Department of Agricultural and Food Sciences of the Alma Mater Studiorum – University of Bologna, where I lead the “BIO-NMR” research group.
I’m director of the Interdepartmental Centre for Industrial Agrofood Research – CIRI Agrofood of the University of Bologna.
I teach at the Food Science Campus: General and Inorganic Chemistry and Applied Chemistry, for bachelor’s degree courses, and Structural Chemistry of Biological Systems for the Master’s Degree in Food Science and Technology.
I’m a member of the Faculty Board of the PhD School of “Nanosciences for Medicine and the Environment” of the University of Bologna from 2017 to 2019.
I’m currently a member of the Faculty Board of the PhD School of “Agricultural, Environmental and Food Science and Technology” of the University of Bologna.
I’m an expert of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) and co-founder of the Foodomics science, a new approach that studies food systems, as a whole with nutrition, to develop strategies aimed at optimizing human health, measured through molecular biomarkers.
Since 2005, I carried out researches aimed at identifying descriptors for the definition of the qualitative characteristics of foods through holistic algorithms, based on molecular fingerprints, developed through spectroscopic methods. My research concerns both plant products protected by quality collective brands, which need particular attention in defining the traceability criteria, and GMO plant products, which require a careful evaluation of the metabolic profile changes introduced with the genetic modification. Since 2009 I’m studying the chemical transformation of food products to define spectroscopic indicators of quality and freshness (shelf-life) also applied to the fish sector. Finally, in collaboration with a team of nutritionists, I developed an in vitro approach to measure the bio-accessibility of nutrients in food products as a result of their digestibility.
Editorial activities
I’m member of the editorial committee of scientific journals: Nutrients (ISSN 2072-6643); Magnetic Resonance in Chemistry (ISSN 0749-1581); Gene & Nutrition (ISSN 1555-8932); Food Research International (ISSN 0963-9969).
I’m member of the editorial committee of scientific journals: Acta Alimentaria (ISSN: 0139-3006); Current Opinion in Food Science (ISSN: 2214-7993); Current Research in Food Science (ISSN: 2665-9271); Foods (ISSN 2304-8158).
Seminars and Conferences
Since 1997, I presented the results of my research in seminars and oral communications at national and international congresses, on topics of theoretical and applied chemistry inherent to electron transfer in photosynthesis mediated by metallo-proteins, e.g.: Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Lvov ( 1997); Physik Department E17, Technische Universität München, Germany (1997); Institut de Chimie Minérale et Analytique, Université de Lausanne (2000).
The most recent (since 2015) oral communications at conferences that are relevant to the food sector are:
- 1) “Foodomics and One Health”. The 5th Asia-Pacific Food Safety International Conference in Hong Kong (Virtual Conference), 27-28 January 2021;
- 2) “The Foodomics contribution to design foods optimized for health: can NMR-based digestomics add further details to food structure definition?”. 34th EFFoST International Conference (Online conference – live and on-demand, 10-12 November 2020);
- 3) “NMR foodomics application to distinguish biodynamic from organic grapes (Vitis vinifera L.)”. Agriculture and Food – Current and Future Challenges – AGRIFA (On-line conference, ICIA Cluj-Napoca – 22-23 October 2020);
- 4) “Bio-circular opportunities to make healthy food more sustainable”. Webinar on Africa and the Circular Economy: Opportunities, Benefits and Trends. (Accra World Trade Centre – October 15th, 2020);
- 5) Ultra-processed foods in the frame of circular economy. 7th International Conference on Nutrition & Growth (Virtual Conference, 27-29 August 2020);
- 6) “NMR Spectroscopy as a Tool of Choice to Approach Foodomics”. 17th NMR Users Meeting. Búzios, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – August 3-7, 2019;
- 7) “Foodomics a powerful approach for traceability”. DISH High Level Summit, New issues and emerging trends in food safety. Bologna, Italy – May 14-15, 2019;
- 8) “The General Chemistry Point of View for Food and Nutrition: from bioinorganic paramagnetic species to system chemistry”. XLVI Congresso Nazionale di Chimica Inorganica. Bologna, Italy – September 10-13, 2018;
- 9) “Nuclear Magnetic Resonance to explore transformations’ landscapes in the food domain”. Workshop Catalysis with Ions, Complexes, Biological Systems, Clusters And Surfaces (CAT-ICBCS), Arcavacata di Rende, Italy – November 3-4, 2017;
- 10) “Multidisciplinary skills for Food Safety”. World Food Research and Innovation Forum – Food Safety on the New Silk Road, Guangzhou (Guandong), China, 20/11/2017;
- 11) “How local stakeholders can contribute exploiting bioeconomy potential of the Region”. ECOMONDO 2017 – Sustainable Mediterranean Bioeconomy, Rimini, Italy, 8/11/2017;
- 12) “Basic Concepts of Metabolomics and Application to the Food and Nutrition Science”. IAFP’s European Symposium on Food Safety. Athens, Greece, 11-13/05/2016;
- 13) “Foodomics: the right approach to discover the link between food and health”, The First Italian-Israeli Forum on Medicine: Food and health, impact of computational and experimental studies. Tel Aviv and Rehovot, Israel 2-3/06/2015.
Competitive Projects
I participated in numerous European projects within the FP7 and H2020 programs:
I was the coordinator of the project KBBE FP7-(GA 266331) “CHANCE – Low cost technologies and traditional ingredients for the production of affordable, nutritionally correct foods Improving Health in Population groups at risk of poverty”, 3 years, Project funding €3.000.000,00
I was a member of the coordination team of the project KBBE FP7 (GA 311876) “PATHWAY27 – Pivotal assessment of the effects of bioactives on health and wellbeing. from human genome to food industry”; 5 years; Project funding € 5.000.000,00
I was the scientific responsible for the Bio-NMR unit in the project KBBE FP7 Capacities (GA 606476) “BAKE4FUN – Innovative biotechnological solutions for the production of new bakery functional foods“; 2 years; Project funding € 874.000,00
I was the leader of the “Food structure and nutrient bioavailability” working-group of the COST Action “FA1005 – INFOGEST” (www.cost-infogest.eu), during the whole duration of the project.
I was responsible for the University of Bologna BIO-NMR unit in the project Food Biomarker Alliance (FoodBAll –H2020 JPI Healthy diet for healthy life); Group funding € 80.000,00.
I was work-package leader of the EU-H2020 Project (ID 817737) “FutureEUAqua – Future growth in sustainable, resilient and climate friendly organic and conventional European aquaculture”; 4 years; Project funding € 6.000.000,00
I was work-package leader of the EU-H2020 Project (ID 862658) “NewTechAqua – New Technologies, Tools and Strategies for a Sustainable, Resilient and Innovative European Aquaculture”; 4 years; Project funding € 6.000.000,00
I was work-package leader of the BLUEBIO COFUND-H2020 Project (ID 817992) “BIOZOOSTAIN – Sustainable utilization of zooplankton as by-products”; 3 years; Project funding € 848.700,00
Steering Activities
I’m Vicepresident of the Agrifood Clust-ER, a public-private association promoted by the Emilia-Romagna Region to support collaborations in strategic R&D sectors.
I’m the representative for the University of Bologna in the Steering Board of the “DISH Global Centre for Food Safety and Quality“, founded by the National Food Institute – Technical University of Denmark (DTU), University of Bologna, Lund University (LU), and The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU).
I’m representative for the University of Bologna in the Steering Board of the “Interuniversity Consortium for Metal-Protein Magnetic Resonances (CIRMMP)”.
I’m delegate of the Conference of Italian University Rectors (CRUI) at the IT4PRIMA national coordination table, activated by the MIUR to support the implementation of the “PRIMA – Partnership for Research and Innovation in the Mediterranean Area” funding program.
I’m member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Subdivision “Magnetic Resonance in Food Science” in the Groupement AMPERE (Atomes et Molécules Par Études Radio-Électriques).
I’m Chair of the Scientific Committee of the International Congress “Foodomics“, which is held every two years since 2009.
Publications and citation indexes
I’m co-author of more than 140 publications in scientific journals and books for international dissemination, available on his academic WEBSITE, ORCID and RESEARCH-ID.
Scopus (Mar 24, 2022) – Publications: 108; h-index: 34; Citations: 2834 (from 2153 documents); Citations excluding self-citations: 2571; Citations excluding those ones from books: 2616.
ISI-WoS (Mar 24, 2022) – Publications: 117; h-index : 32; Citations: 2759 (from 2058 documents); Average citations per item: 23.78; Citations excluding self-citations: 2485; Citing articles excluding self-citations: 1980.
Google Scholar (Mar 24, 2022) – Publications: 152; h-index: 38; i10-index: 78; Citations: 3724 (455 in 2021 – 148 in 2022).
With reference to Italian D.lgs. 196/2003 I expressly authorize the use of my personal and professional data reported in the curriculum