I did my Ph.D. in Neuroscience at the University of Cagliari, Italy (2007-2010), where I studied the endocannabinoid and enkephalin systems as therapeutic targets for treating inflammation and neuropathic pain. In particular, I explored the therapeutic effects of selective activation of the cannabinoid receptor subtype CB2 in inflammatory and neuropathic pain mouse models.
I continued my academic career as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Southern California, USA (2010-2012), where I studied the endocannabinoid system’s role in mood disorders.
In 2012, I was awarded a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Research Fellow Grant for the PET-BRAIN project, a collaboration between Pharmaness-Neuroscienze Italy and the University of Aberdeen (Scotland, UK) (2012-2014). The aim of this project was to identify and map the brain using PET radiolabeled cannabinoid (CB1) ligands.
Since 2014, I have been working at the NVS Department at Karolinska Institutet. My research is primarily focused on characterizing new target proteins and mechanisms involved in the biological bases of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Specifically, I am studying the pathophysiological role of intramembrane signal peptide peptidases in AD. For this purpose, we use a new AD mouse model and several human cell lines. My research is also focused on evaluating the role of the endocannabinoidergic system (ECS) in neurological-related disorders and the biological mechanisms by which the ECS is involved in neurodegenerative diseases such as AD.