Speakers
Christophe Brunet obtained his PhD degree in 1994 at the University of Paris VI (France) in Biological Oceanography, with a thesis on microalgal pigment variation and primary production in the English Channel. He spent then one year as post doc at the University of Lille and won a post-doctoral Marie Curie grant at the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn (1995-1996, Naples, Italy). From 1997-2000, he had an Associated professor position Maître de Conférences" at the University of Littoral Cote d'Opale (Wimereux, France). In 2000, he became staff scientist at the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn (Naples, Italy). Since 2017, he is senior scientist at the SZN. His current research focuses on the biotechnological use of marine microalgal resource. He is mainly involved in the improvement of growth yield of microalgae - mainly diatoms – and on the modulation of secondary metabolites production through light manipulation. During the course he will provide an overview of fundamental and applied research as well as in technological development for improving the role and importance of microalgae in biotechnological applications.
Christophe Brunet
Department of Marine Biotechnology
Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn
Villa Comunale, 80121 Naples, Italy
E-mail: christophe.brunet@szn.it
Tel: +39 081 5833 262
Wiebe Kooistra obtained his PhD degree at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands, on a thesis assessing dispersal patterns and modes of tropical seaweeds. From 1993-1996 he did postdoctoral research in the group of Dr Linda Medlin at the Alfred-Wegener-Institute, Bremerhaven, Germany, on the evolutionary history of the diatoms. From 1996-2000 he had a research fellowship at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, during which he studied the diversity and evolution of calcareous green seaweeds, their morphological adaptation to diverse tropical marine habitats and assessing their biogeography. In 2000 he became staff scientist at the SZN. His current research focuses on the morphological diversity and evolutionary history of planktonic diatoms and incorporates taxonomy and barcoding of strains as well as the use of metabarcode data to explore the diversity and seasonality of selected genera. He has developed extensive experience in raising and maintaining a culture collection of marine microalgae for his research.
Wiebe H.C.F. Kooistra
Department of Integrative Marine Ecology
Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn
Villa Comunale, 80121 Naples, Italy
E-mail: kooistra@szn.it
Tel: +39 081 5833 271
Andrea Conforto, after his Master Degree in Chemistry at "Università degli studi di Napoli - Federico II" (Italy), obatined his PhD degree in 2007 at the "Seconda Università degli studi di Napoli-"SUN", Caserta (Italy) in Environmental Science. During the PhD, done in collaboration with Dutch multinational Royal DSM (now DSM-Firmenich), he started working as Process Engineer for production of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) and Food ingredients at DSM Capua production site in Italy. After the PhD he spent other 7 years in DSM (Capua site and Delft Biotech Center in Delft, The Netherlands) covering different positions in the organizations always in the microbial fermentation field (Project Manager for Tech Transfer, Costing Manager, Project Director). After DSM experience he moved to the business side of microbial fermentation CDMO, working for Patheon (as Account Manager), for Capua BioServices spa (as Business Development Manager) and now for Olon spa as Vice President of the CDMO Biotech division. He his taking care with his team of business development, account management, business intelligence and marketing activities for the CDMO biotech division for pharmaceutical and food business. He collaborates with big corporation and start-ups to support them for technology transfer, process development and manufacturing for new API and new ingredients for food and infant food market using precision fermentation.
Andrea Conforto
Vice President CDMO Biotech
Olon spa - Strada Rivoltana, km 6/7 - 20053 Rodano (MI) Italy
E-mail: aconforto@olonspa.it
Transitioning from a background in biotechnology and bioinformatics, I embarked on a path driven by my passion for microalgal biotechnology and its industrial applications. Following the completion of my Ph.D. in microalgae biology, and some years as a senior researcher I made the decision to leave the university setting and fully immerse myself in the exploration of sustainable microalgae biorefinery concepts. My primary focus revolves around the production of high-added value compounds within this field. I start-up different company in the field since I left the academic carrier, and all of the are still on the market, I am author and co-authors of different research papers and book chapter, and 2 different patent related to the field of microalgae production.
Antonio Idà PhD
CEO Algaria srl
Via Ruggiero Settimo 4
20146 ; Milano Italia
E-mail: antonio@spireat.it
Tel: +39 3477998032
I am a Cell Biologist. My research focuses on seeking new bioactive compounds from marine organisms with pharmacological, nutraceutical or cosmeceutical applications. My expertise regards bioactivity measurements using in vitro tests on several human cell lines. My competences are applied on biomass/fractions from marine microalgae or invertebrates. I investigate at a functional point of view the cell signalling pathways in the human cell line induced by the marine derived compounds using molecular approach. Since 2010, I entered into the marine biotechnological research world. I developed more and more my competence on bioactivity and biomedical applications of natural products, enriching my expertise with marine organisms, such as microalgae or invertebrates. During this 10 years period, I mainly developed interest for nutraceutical or cosmeceutical applications with a focus on the synergy between bioactive compounds to enhance the bioactive property of the product. I investigated at gene expression level, the cell signalling pathways induced by marine derived compounds, I invented a method for the prediction of cell fate based on molecular analysis and bioinformatic algorithm that are object of my patent (812019000108834) already approved at european commission in 2022. I was involved in the launching of the Spin-Off BioSearch S.r.l. with the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn, ICB-CNR Institute and Italbiotech (Non-profit organization). Since 2017 I am Researcher in the Marine Biotechnology department of the Stazione Zoologica "Anton Dohrn" (SZN) as permanent staff.
Clementina Sansone
Department of Marine Biotechnology
Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn
Villa Comunale, 80121 Naples, Italy
E-mail: clementina.sansone@szn.it
Tel: +39 081 5833 262
Sarah D'Adamo holds a MSc. in industrial biotechnology and PhD degree in biotechnology, curriculum: biochemistry and biophysics, both obtained at the University of Study of Padova, Italy. She then worked as post-doctoral fellow and research associate at the Chemistry Dept.ment of Colorado School of Mines, United States of America, following projects on redox and hydrogen metabolism of green microalgae. She has been senior scientist and lead scientist at Algenuity, a microalgal biotech start-up company based in England. She is a tenure-track Associate Professor in microalgae cell factory design at the Bioprocess Engineering division of Wageningen University (WUR), The Netherlands. Overall, she has >12 years of both international academic and industrial experience in the field of microalgae physiology and biotechnology, conducted in Italy, USA, UK and, NL. Expertise includes biotechnology, biochemistry, molecular biology, analytical chemistry, biophysics, redox reactions, photosynthesis, metabolic engineering, strain engineering, bioprocess, nutraceutical production.
Sarah d'Adamo
Associate professor
Wageningen University and Research
The Netherlands
* sarah.dadamo@wur.nl
Raffaele De Palma graduated as MD at the University of Naples "Federico II". He obtained his PhD at the Second University of Naples, Italy, on a thesis evaluating modulation of antigen specific T cell responses using Altered Peptide Ligands. From 1993 to 1996 he joined as Postdoctoral Fellow and then as Research Scientist I the Immunogenetic Section of Blood Research Institute, Milwaukee (WI, USA) where he contributed to develop an innovative technique to characterize T cell receptor specificity. Since then, he has focused his research interests on the study of immune responses, and modulation of immune responses in vitro and in vivo. He worked at the IRCCS Maugeri Institute in Pavia from 1997 to 1999. He has been Visiting Researcher in several places, as The Basel Institute of Immunology and The Harvard University. In 2000 he joined, first as Researcher and then as Professor, the Second University of Naples. In 2019 moved to the University of Genova as full Professor of Clinical Immunology and Allergy, where he is also Director of the Clinical Immunology Unit at the San Martino IRCCS-University Hospital. His research focus is still dealing with the characterization and modulation of immune responses and, in the last years, he contributed to develop several compounds which have been shown to have immune modulating effects. During the course he will provide an overview of all strategies to be used to characterize the effects of marine derived compounds on immune system and immune responses in vitro and in vivo.
Raffaele De Palma
Department of Internal Medicine
University of Genova
Viale Benedetto XV, 6-16132, Genova (Italy)
E-mail: raffaele.depalma@unige.it
Tel: +39 0103537900
Mariella Ferrante graduated in Biological Sciences in 1998 with a thesis in molecular biology and obtained her PhD in Genetics in 2004 at the University of Naples Federico II. She carried out her PhD project at the Telethon Institute of Genetics and Medicine (Italy), working on the identification of disease genes and on the generation of mouse mutants. She then spent five years as postdoctoral researcher at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Cambridge (UK), using zebrafish as a model for developmental disorders. Researcher, since September 2010, and then Senior Researcher, since 2020, at the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn of Naples, (Italy), associate to the National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics, Trieste (Italy) since 2022, she focuses on the molecular mechanisms underlying diatom biology, through functional genomics, genetics and molecular biology. Main interests of her lab are diatom life cycles, diatom genomics, and the definition of signal transduction mechanisms that mediate the perception of external stimuli in diatom cells, using transcriptomics and reverse genetics approaches. Her team is also involved in the generation of tools for genome editing in diatoms.
Mariella Ferrante
Department of Integrative Marine Ecology
Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn
Associate to the National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics (OGS)
Villa Comunale
80121 Napoli, Italy
Tel. +39 081 5833268
E-mail: mariella.ferrante@szn.it
I am an organic chemist working on natural products. I investigate the isolation and identification of chemical compounds from marine organisms that may have potential pharmaceutical uses or influence biological, pathophysiological, or ecological processes. From a disciplinary point of view, my scientific goals are largely overlapping with those of Chemical Biology which uses chemical approaches and small molecules to understand and manipulate biological systems.In this context, I am mainly interested in both understanding the metabolic pathways and molecular mechanisms underlying cellular processes lato sensu, and the ability of small organic molecules to perturb, visualize and measure biological systems and properties.Using a translational approach, the topics span from basic studies to applications in medicine or biotechnology, involving research activities that include:
• chemical biology and early drug discovery of new antitumor and immunomodulatory compounds; • isolation, structural characterization, and chemical synthesis of natural products;
• biochemical secondary pathways and biosynthesis of natural products;
• mechanisms of action and chemical communication involving lipids and small molecules.
New technologies based on chromatography, spectroscopy, NMR and MS also fall within my field of interest. Furthermore, I am scientifically intrigued by synthetic biology when supported by chemical tools or aimed at performing a new type of chemical transformation.
Angelo Fontana
Department of Biology, University of Naples "Federico II″, via Cinthia, Bldg.7, 80126 Naples, Italy
*Email: afontana@icb.cnr.it
Julien Henri obtained his PhD degree in biochemistry and structural biology at the University Paris-Saclay, France. In 2013 he joined Sorbonne University faculty as associate professor to study macromolecular structures and assemblies including those of the enzymes catalyzing the Calvin-Benson-Bassham cycle of carbon fixation in the model microalga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. Through systematic preparation of recombinant proteins at large scale he achieved the determination of high-resolution crystal structures of several enzymes of the cycle, along with their thioredoxin post-translational regulators. By integrating protein structures with the rich omics resource available for microalgae, he aims at describing carbon fixation as a global biochemical model. During the course he will present the current knowledge of protein structure-function relationships in the Calvin-Benson-Bassham cycle. Analytical models aided with state-of-the-art computational tools enable rational synthetic biology that offers new opportunities to improve photosynthetic capacities.
Julien Henri
Laboratory
of Computational and Quantitative Biology
Sorbonne
University
7 quai
Saint Bernard, 75005 Paris, France
E-mail: julien.henri@sorbonne-universite.fr
Tel: +33 1 44 27 66 06
Marina Isidori
Qualifica: Professore Ordinario
Settore scientifico disciplinare: MED/42
Dipartimento di afferenza: Dipartimento di Scienze e Tecnologie Ambientali Biologiche e Farmaceutiche (DISTABiF)
Telefono: 0823274565
E-mail: marina.isidori@unicampania.it
Olaf Kruse
University of Bielefeld
Faculty of Biology / Algenbiotechnologie und Bioenergie
E-Mail: olaf.kruse@uni-bielefeld.de
Alessandra Rogato obtained a Ph.D. in Advanced Biology at the University of Naples Federico II in 2007. From 2009 to 2011, she was post-doc at the Laboratory of Genomics of Microorganisms/Diatom Functional Genomics Team UMR 7238 CNRS-UPMC, Paris, France. She obtained a permanent position as researcher at the Institute of Biosciences and BioResources of the CNR in Naples in 2011and since 2016, she is Associate Researcher at the Department of Integrative Marine Ecology, SZN "A. Dohrn", Naples. Her research activity focuses on understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying the ecological and evolutionary success of marine diatoms, integrating genomic and genetic resources with well-established physiological and biophysical approaches to characterize nutrient regulated processes. In particular, she is focusing on the pathways of uptake and assimilation of nitrogen (N) and, on the role played by N transporters as sensors of the external N conditions.
Alessandra Rogato
Institute of Biosciences and
Bioresources (IBBR-CNR)
Via Pietro Castellino, Naples, Italy
Monia T. Russo obtained her PhD in Molecular Genetics of Development and Differentiation at the SZN in Naples in 2005, on a thesis on gene regulatory mechanisms underlying basal chordate embryo development. In 2008 she carried out postdoctoral research at Ceinge - Biotecnologie Avanzate in Naples, studying the role of genes involved in the control of cell proliferation using mouse and human cell model systems. These experiences allowed her to master various molecular biology techniques, a number of genetic transformation methods and several mutagenesis approaches in different model organisms, all based on the establishment of robust and reliable culture protocols. In 2010, she started to work on diatoms at the SZN developing molecular tools for the genetic manipulation of diatoms. Using Phaeodactylum tricornutum as a reference molecular model, she established the nuclear transformation of the ecologically relevant diatom genus Pseudo-nitzschia and contributed to its promotion as a model system for functional studies. Her current research aims to address fundamental ecological questions, such as control of cell growth and redox homeostasis, and to improve strains for the production of bioactive compounds through gene gain and loss of function using genetic engineering and genome editing tools.