Board of Directors

Beatrice Bodega graduated in Medical Biotechnology in 2003 and obtained a PhD in Biotechnology Applied to Medical Sciences in 2006 at the University of Milan.

In 2009 she moved to Rome, to the laboratory of Valerio Orlando (Dulbecco Telethon Institute at the Santa Lucia Foundation), to specialise in epigenetics and in investigating the role of transposable elements (LINE1) in human cell differentiation.

In 2014 she started her independent career as Group Leader at INGM. Since 2021 she has been Associate Professor of Molecular Biology at the University of Milan.

For 20 years she has been working to understand the molecular function of non-coding DNA, in particular in the modulation of cellular processes (differentiation, homeostasis, plasticity), and how this portion of the genome modulates the response to the environment, adaptation and the progression of human diseases.

Her laboratory combines molecular, genomic and advanced imaging approaches with computational biology to describe the molecular mechanisms of DNA repetitive sequences, particularly transposable elements, in human biology, with a strong focus on translational aspects of biomedical research.

Sergio Abrignani is Manager and Scientific Director of INGM, the Istituto Nazionale di Genetica Molecolare “Romeo ed Enrica Invernizzi”, and Full Professor of Pathology and Immunology at the University of Milan. He has 20 years of international experience in vaccine research in pharma and biotech environments and 15 years of academic research experience in a non-profit research institute (INGM) at the University of Milan.

He received his MD from the University of Padova. From 1986 to 1993 he worked as lab head at the Ciba-Geigy Research Centre in Basel (Switzerland). From 1993 to 1999 he was Director of the Immunology and Virology Research Unit at Chiron Vaccines in Siena (Italy).

From 1999 to 2005 he was Vice President of R&D at Chiron Corporation in San Francisco (USA). Since 2006 he has been Manager and Scientific Director of INGM, a non-profit research foundation aimed at the discovery and early development of new therapies and diagnostics for human diseases (neoplastic, infectious and autoimmune), with a particular interest in secondary prevention.

His research has focused on immunology and on the interactions between viruses and human cells. He has published about 130 scientific papers, with an h-index of 73 (GS) and more than 22,000 citations, and holds about 30 granted international patents. He is a member of many Italian and international scientific societies and academies. For his studies on the hepatitis C virus, in 2004 he received the Public Health Gold Medal of Merit from the President of the Italian Republic.

In 2011 he was awarded an ERC Advanced Grant, the most important and prestigious competitive grant for European researchers. He has been a member of the Consiglio Superiore di Sanità of the Ministry of Health since 2019, and in 2021 he was appointed member of the Italian National Advisory Board (CTS) for the COVID pandemic.

Raffaele De Francesco earned a degree in Biology from the University of Milan. He was then a postdoctoral fellow at Emory University, Atlanta (USA), and at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, Germany.

Between 1991 and 2008 he led several drug discovery programmes at the Merck Research Laboratory in Pomezia, Italy. In 2008 he joined INGM as Group Leader, heading the Virology laboratory.

In December 2019 he was appointed Professor of Microbiology in the Department of Pharmacological and Biomolecular Sciences (DiSFeB) at the University of Milan. He is internationally recognised for his work on the molecular virology of viruses causing chronic hepatitis and for his key contributions to antiviral drug discovery.

He has published more than 150 papers in peer-reviewed journals and is an inventor on many international patents. His current research focuses on the identification of new therapeutic strategies for the cure of chronic and acute viral infections.

Antonio Falcone has 25 years of experience in Asset Management at major companies such as Deutsche Bank Group, Diners Italia, Axa Assicurazioni and Unicredit, with a significant track record of roles, positions held and objectives achieved.

In particular, he was investment manager of the Inarcassa Pension Fund, where for three consecutive years he won the IPE award as Best European Fund Manager for risk allocation and for the Alternative Investments category.

He held the positions of Head of Institutional Investors, head of the Rome office and member of the Asset Allocation committee at Kairos Partners.

In 2013 he became a shareholder and CEO of Principia SGR, relaunching its business and creating the most important Italian venture capital fund focused on Health Care, with more than 200 million in assets.

Over the years he has also worked as a Business Angel and advisor, and has been a member of various Advisory Boards of private equity funds such as Ambienta SGR, Perennius and Alto Partners.

Riccardo Rosati is Full Professor of Surgery, specialised in general and thoracic surgery.

He headed the division of general and minimally invasive surgery at Humanitas (1996-2014); since 2014 he has headed the department of gastrointestinal surgery at San Raffaele Hospital and the residency programme in General Surgery at Vita-Salute University.

He is past president of ESDE (European Society for Diseases of the Esophagus), having been its president in 2020-22. He is the author of over 400 publications and holds patents for surgical instruments.

Prof. Rosati has extensive experience in open and minimally invasive surgery of the digestive tract, especially in the field of foregut and large bowel diseases.

The department he heads is the highest-volume in Italy and one of the highest in Europe for gastroesophageal diseases. He founded and directed CURE (University Center for Research and Care of Esophagogastric Diseases), University of Milan School of Medicine, 2006-2014, and currently chairs CERCA e riCERCA (Gastrocenter), a multidisciplinary centre for comprehensive clinical management and translational research in GI diseases at San Raffaele Hospital.

Massimo Rossi was born in Piacenza on 15 March 1948 and moved to Milan in 1954.

After studying at Liceo Classico Carducci and graduating in law from the University of Milan, he has been practising as a lawyer in Milan since 1976.

Since 2006 he has also been registered as a freelance journalist with the Lombardy Order of Journalists.

Antonio Lanzavecchia is renowned for his work on antigen presentation, T lymphocyte activation, immunological memory and studies on human monoclonal antibodies.

He earned his medical degree from the University of Pavia, where he specialised in paediatrics and infectious diseases. Since 1983 he has been working in Switzerland, initially as a member of the Basel Institute for Immunology and, since 2000, as founder and director of the Institute for Research in Biomedicine in Bellinzona.

He has been Professor of Immunology at the University of Genoa, the University of Siena and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich. He is a member of EMBO and of the Royal College of Physicians, and an honorary member of the American Society of Immunology, the Swiss Society for Immunology and the Swiss Academy of Medical Sciences.

He has received several prestigious awards, including the EMBO Gold Medal, the Cloëtta Prize, the Robert Koch Prize, the Sanofi-Institut Pasteur Prize and the Louis-Jeantet Prize for Medicine.

He is the scientific founder of Humabs Biomed, now a subsidiary of Vir Biotechnology, where he is currently a senior researcher. His academic research continues at INGM.