Francesca PROPERZI
Francesca PROPERZI
(Istituto Superiore di Sanità)
Francesca Properzi graduated at the University of Rome "La Sapienza" in 1997, obtaining a First Class Degree with Distinction in Molecular Biology. She later obtained an MSc Degree in 1999, working in collaboration with Michel Goedert at the Laboratory of Molecular Biology of the MRC in Cambridge (UK) and later, in 2003, a PhD Degree in Neuronal Regeneration at the Brain Repair Centre, MRC, University of Cambridge (UK). Here she worked with Prof James Fawcett on the cellular substrates, which are inhibitory to axonal growth after CNS injury. By using RT-PCR and main molecular biology techniques she identified the glial chondroitin-6-sulfate biosynthetic pathway, as a key mechanism of axon-growth inhibition after CNS injury.
During the following six years, she was a senior investigator scientist (band 3) at the MRC Prion Unit in London. She initially joined the team of Prof Charles Weissmann and worked on prion diseases and exosomes by using cellular and molecular biology techniques. For her research she has been awarded with the Tony Ball Prize in 2005 as best young investigator in prion diseases in UK. She recently joined the Istituto Superiore di Sanità in Rome as first investigator working in the Department of Cellular Biology and Neuroscience, managed by Prof. Maurizio Pocchiari. Here, she is leading a project on the role of exosomes in neurodegenerative disease that was funded by AriSLA in 2013 (ExoSLA) for ALS diagnostic research and by Alliance Biosecure in 2013 (ExoQuick) for prion diseases. She participated to many national and international conferences and has contributed to 24 publications. Her research experience and interests are focused on molecular and cellular models of neurodegenerative diseases.
