Prof. Emira Ayroldi was born in Ostuni, Italy, on November 17, 1955. She earned her M.D. degree in 1984 and completed a Ph.D. in Experimental Medicine at the University "La Sapienza" in Rome in 1989. From 1985 to 1989, she worked as a Visiting Fellow at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Laboratory of Experimental Immunology, Frederick, Maryland, USA. She served as a Researcher at the Institute of Pharmacology, University of Perugia, from 1991 to 2001, and has held the position of Associate Professor of Pharmacology at the Department of Medicine and Surgery, University of Perugia, since 2002. Her research focuses on the pharmacological modulation of apoptosis and cell proliferation, with particular emphasis on the physiological and therapeutic roles of glucocorticoids. Her work includes the study of lymphocyte apoptosis regulation, cytokine-mediated T cell activation, and the molecular pharmacology of glucocorticoids and glucocorticoid-induced genes in models of inflammation and cancer.