Mariapaola Marino received her MD degree with honors from the School of Medicine, Catholic University, Rome, in 1997, and a PhD in Integrated Oncology from Catholic University, Rome, in 2006. Since 2012, she has been an Assistant Professor at the Department of Translational Medicine and Surgery, Section of General Pathology, UCSC. Her research interests mainly focus on autoimmune and inflammatory disease research, with particular attention to the identification and validation of new biomarkers for disease diagnosis, and monitoring of follow-up.