AlessandraBoletta San Raffaele Scientific InstituteItaly

Dr. Boletta graduated in Biology at the University of Pavia, Italy. She carried out her Ph.D-equivalent training at the Mario Negri Institute in Bergamo, Italy working on gene delivery to the kidney prior to moving to the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA for her post-doctoral training. Here, she started her scientific activity on Polycystic Kidney Disease, by working on heterologous expression of Polycystin-1 aimed at establishing cellular models to investigate the Polycystins function. rr rrShe moved back to Italy thanks to a Telethon Career Program and a Marie Curie Excellence Award to establish her lab at the San Raffaele Scientific Institute in Milan. Here, she covered the position of Director for the Division of Genetics and Cell Biology (2014-2019) and she is currently Head of Research Unit. Over the years, her lab has developed several cellular and animal models with the aim of studying Polycystins function and the pathophysiology of ADPKD. Her laboratory has identified metabolic reprogramming as an important feature of the disease, offering several new options for therapy as well as novel insights into the pathogenesis of ADPKD.