Dr. Lara Poles is currently working at the Department of Agricultural, Food and Environmental (Di3A) of the University of Catania and she is involved in projects concerning the genetic improvement of tree species; in particular, she has worked on the application of transformation and genome editing techniques in citrus (development of new seedless varieties and validation of pigmentation genes) and in grapevine (obtaining resistant varieties, improvement of local cultivars). She earned her Master degree in Industrial Biotechnology in 2012 at Padua and then Lara started a 6 months internships at CREA-VIT (Conegliano Italy) were she performed diagnostics and biological analysis for the identification of pathogens and grapes disease. In 2013 she took up a position at FEM (San Michele all’Adige, Italy) and started working on FEM apple breeding program through MAS. Since 2015 she worked at Innovation Fruit Consortium (CIF) developing new markers for apple scab resistance, and following the developing and the marketability of new apple varieties. She gained experience on fingerprint analysis on different fruit species ranging from apple to plum, walnut and grapes; during these years she worked also in field, studying phenology of apple plants and carrying on trial evaluations. In 2023 Lara completed her PhD in Agricultural Food and Environmental Science at Catania University in collaboration with CREA-OFA (Acireale CT).