From Sicily to the United States in the sign of research on neurodegenerative diseases, neurogenesis, cancerogenesis and metabolic disorders. Five post-graduate students and two post-doctorate students of the PhD course of International Research on Biomedicine and Clinical Neurosciences of the University of Palermo recently participated in the 11th edition of the annual Conference of Italian Researchers in the World, promoted by the Comites in Houston, in partnership with the Italian Consulate General. The researchers presented the group work conducted in collaboration by the University of Palermo and the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) of Galveston. The PhD students are Mauro Montalbano, Claudia Marino, Filippa Lo Cascio, Emanuele Mocciaro and Salvo Saieva, and the post-doctorate students are Alberto Fucarino and Michela Marcatti. At the conference, the students presented the state-of-the-art project, coordinated by Prof. Fabio Bucchieri of the Department of Human Anatomy of Bionec, on the study of the effects of the absence of gravity on the respiratory apparatus, financed by the European Space Agency in partnership with Nasa, the UTMB, the Universities of Southampton and Leiden and the Euro-Mediterranean Institute of Science and Technology. “During the recent visit to Houston of the President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, we illustrated our international doctorate curriculum which favourably impressed him and he congratulated us for our work. He also wrote us a letter after he returned to Italy to express his best wishes for our Conference, in which he underscored the importance of this collaboration between Italy and the State of Texas,” said Luca Cicalese, professor of Transplant Surgery at the UTMB, organizer of the Conference and the U.S. official in charge of the doctorate internationalisation agreement.
FACTSHEET / THE COMITES IN HOUSTON
The members of the Comites for the Consular District of Houston (Arkansas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Texas) were elected on 17 April 2015. The president is Valter Della Nebbia, born in Chieti. After completing his studies at the Aeronautical Academy of Pozzuoli in 1989, he moved to the United States in 1991 where he undertook a career in civil aviation and in the real-estate business. He also obtained a degree in Aeronautical Sciences from the University Federico II of Naples in 2000 and a degree in Political Science from the University of Trieste in 2005.
