I am a researcher in the Biochemistry and Molecular Biotechnologies Unit, at the University of Calabria. Since 2007 I am involved in the study of plasma membrane, lysosomal and vesicular transporters of amino acids and organic cations. In 2009 and 2010, I have worked for the WHO in Lyon (France) where I was involved in the study of transforming properties of HPVs. I have supervised several undergraduate students for master thesis. My research interest in membrane transporters is linked to several aspects of metabolism in health and diseases with particular reference to absorption, distribution and excretion of nutrients and drugs. The study of transporters is conducted using substrates labelled with radioisotopes or fluorescent molecules. By combined approaches of bioinformatics and site-directed mutagenesis, structure/function relationships studies are possible, to identify critical residues for protein activity. Cell biology approaches allow performing studies on transporter trafficking and expression levels in normal and cancerous tissue clarifying aspects still unknown. This research field has the scope of identifying new therapeutic targets and of protocols for large-scale screening of drugs in order to improve drug design. I am co-author of more than 40 publications, among which relevant papers on Nature Communication, Scientific Reports and Cell; I am member of scientific societies.
Well done!
