Need Institute Foundation announces the hiring of Dr. Lucia Buccarello, as postdoctoral neurobiologist researcher, for translational research on Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). Lucia Buccarello graduated in Pharmaceutical Biotechnology at the University of Milan. She carried out her experimental thesis work at the Neuroscience department of the “Mario Negri” Pharmacological Research Institute, investigating the mechanism through which beta amyloid (Aβ) oligomers, accumulated in Alzheimer’s Disease patients’ brain, induce synaptic dysfunction and cognitive deterioration, and the potential neuroprotective role of doxycycline in reverting these harmful events. She later obtained her PhD, in collaboration with the University of Milan and the Mario Negri Institute, focused on the impact of nutrition in the accumulation of Aβ plaques in Alzheimer’s Disease, and in particular on the neurodegenerative mechanisms which contribute to synaptic dysfunction and cognitive impairment, in a mouse model of Alzheimer’s Disease. She continued her career as a post-doc at the Neuroscience Department of the Mario Negri Institute and the Pharmacology Department of the University of Milan, targeting her studies at the underlying mechanism of synaptic dysfunction and neuronal death in neurodegenerative and neuro-developmental diseases. Subsequently, she investigated the role of the Tau protein in the SUMOylation process and in the synaptic dysfunction associated with Alzheimer’s Disease, at the EBRI-Rita Levi Montalcini Foundation in Rome.

Dr. Lucia Buccarello, as a researcher at Need Institute, will be responsible for developing the research project “Analysis of potential biomarkers for the pathology of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS)”, by examining the contribution of synaptic proteins to the onset and progression of ALS.