Riccardo Marini is the Head of Research at WiLab, the National Laboratory of Wireless Communications of CNIT, and has served as the Area Leader for the Large-Scale Wireless Networks Research Area since 2023. He earned both his M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Telecommunications Engineering from the University of Bologna. He coordinates multiple research projects in collaboration with industrial partners and leads the Grand Challenge on Network Digital Twins within Italy’s national RESTART program. His research focuses on autonomous networks, non-terrestrial networks, and AI-native paradigms, through the design and validation of next-generation protocols, architectures, and proof-of-concepts.