Head: Fulvia Pimpinelli, MD
STAFF

Mission

• Laboratory diagnosis and basic research projects in the field of dermatology, immunology, oncology, viral and microbial diseases
• Laboratory contribution to the clinical development of Phase I-II-III clinical trials of medicinal products/vaccines in the fields of immunology, dermatology, oncology and infectious diseases
• Development of novel laboratory test as well as therapeutic or preventative vaccination strategies against infectious and /or neoplastic diseases
• Development and organization of cross functional teams and overall organization to ensure, quality, efficiency, risks reduction and budget delivery
• Establishing partnerships and providing scientific, technical and strategic background for the conduction of national and international research projects and clinical studies

Research Activity

The team is composed of an experienced staff with complementary expertise and a long-standing scientific activity, which gave rise to a number of publications in indexed journals. Clinical and laboratory activities are focused on infectious, neoplastic and immunologic disorders of the skin and to the diagnosis, characterization and care of sexually-transmitted diseases. Main research areas include studies aimed at elucidating mechanisms of viral pathogenesis, exploitable for the development/validation of novel laboratory assays and/or vaccine development. A relevant effort has been devoted to studies on microbial diseases aimed at developing and validating novel assays to characterize microbial biofilms, mechanisms of biofilm-related drug resistance and at testing drug resistance mechanisms of biofilm-forming bacteria. More recent developments include the implementation of a novel diagnostic platform for molecular diagnosis, virological assessment and clinical research on SARS-CoV-2 infection in the context of the ongoing pandemic.