Research Fellwoship
Ecosustainable Marine Biotechnology Department

Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn
Villa Comunale
80121 Napoli - Italia

Tel.: +39 081 5833315
E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Curriculum Vitae

Supervisor: Valerio Zupo
Appointed on project: ADVISE

Research Interests

Marine environment is far from being fully explored and represent an untapped reservoir of chemical biodiversity, offering a huge potential for the isolation of a wide range of products such as drugs, supplements, energy, green chemicals and biomaterials. Marine cyanobacteria are prokaryotic photosynthetic microorganisms endowed with unique physiological characteristics and high adaptive abilities, that allow them to live under a wide range of environmental conditions.
My current research aims to unlock the potential of marine cyanobacteria as a sustainable source of novel bioactive compounds, especially endowed with antitumor and chemo-preventive activity. In detail, 70 microbial samples were collected in different marine and thermal environments, from where all cyanobacterial strains will be isolated and identified by means of molecular biology and microscopy techniques. Moreover, large-scale cultivations will be set up for the identified strains in order to obtain massive production of biomass and, consequently, of bioactive compounds.

Selected Publications

Parrilli E, Ricciardelli A, Casillo A, Sannino F, Papa R, Tilotta M, Artini M, Selan L, Corsaro MM, Tutino ML. Large-scale biofilm cultivation of Antarctic bacterium Pseudoalteromonas haloplanktis TAC125 for physiologic studies and drug discovery. Extremophiles. 2016 Mar;20(2):227-34.

Artini M, Papa R, Vrenna G, Lauro C, Ricciardelli A, Casillo A, Corsaro MM, Tutino ML, Parrilli E, Selan L. Cold-adapted bacterial extracts as a source of anti-infective and antimicrobial compounds against Staphylococcus aureus. Future Microbiol. 2019 Nov;14:1369-1382.

Ricciardelli A, Casillo A, Corsaro MM, Tutino ML, Parrilli E, van der Mei HC. Pentadecanal and pentadecanoic acid coatings reduce biofilm formation of Staphylococcus epidermidis on PDMS. Pathog Dis. 2020 Feb 27.