BIO
Dr. Elisa Giovannetti obtained her M.D. and Ph.D. at the University of Pisa, Italy, where she also worked as a clinical fellow in Pharmacology, with a special focus on translational studies on gene expression/polymorphisms and anticancer drug response in pancreatic and lung cancer. Since 2006 she has collaborated with the Department of Medical Oncology at VU University Medical Center (VUmc), Amsterdam, The Netherlands, to set-up a line of research on molecular mechanisms underlying chemoresistance and new biomarkers. She was promoted to Associate Professor in 2016. She successfully requested funding from several national and international organizations, including “Marie Curie”, FP7 and H2020 European Initiatives, Italian Association for Research against Cancer (AIRC, Start-Up grant and IG), Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO, VENI grant), Dutch Cancer Society (KWF), American Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation and Fondazione Pisana per la Scienza (FPS).
She is actively involved, as Secretary of the Steering Committee, in research projects within the “Pharmacology and Molecular Mechanism Group” (PAMM) group of the European Organization for research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC), Italian Association for the Study of the Pancreas (AISP) and European Pancreatic Club (EPC).
RESEARCH
Dr. Elisa Giovannetti and her team evaluate molecular mechanisms underlying activity and resistance of anticancer agents, in pancreatic cancer. These studies aim at improving systemic therapies, either through the discovery/development of novel targets and innovative agents/combinations of chemo- and targeted therapies, or through the tailoring of existing treatments for specific patients, using cutting-edge omics technology platforms as well as appropriate clinical specimens and preclinical models.
Current research projects at FPS (Pisa, IT) and CCA (Amsterdam, NL) include:
– Development of new preclinical models to test innovative therapies and treatment tailoring
– Integrative mechanobiology and genomics profiling of resistance patterns to foster novel therapeutics
– Evaluation of liquid biopsies for early detection and monitoring of pancreatic cancer, and of the role of extracellular-vesicles in pancreatic cancer progression for the individualized selection of effective drugs
HOBBIES/EXTRA
Travelling, reading.