University of Bologna
The University of Bologna, Alma Mater Studiorum (UNIBO), was founded in 1088 and it is considered to be the oldest university in Western Europe. It accounts for 100,000 enrolled students, 23 faculties, 69 departments, and 3,000 academics. The University of Bologna successfully participated in FP6 with a total of 103 projects funded by the European Commission in the different specific programmes. The University acted as coordinator in 14 of these projects. As far as FP7 is concerned, 32 projects have so far been selected for funding.
Role
UNIBO will provide research expertise on entomology, plant physiology, plant-insect multitrophic relationships, GMO contamination, environmental modelling and landscape ecology. UNIBO will contribute to field studies in non-GM agrosystem (WP2), data collection for long terms effects (WP3), plant-pest-natural enemy interactions (WP5), standardization of lab testing methods for pollinators (WP6), exposure and hazard model design (WP7) and WP10 (Assessing the economic impacts of GM crops).
Staff members’ profile
Prof. Giovanni Burgio (PhD, UNIBO coordinator), senior entomologist, he manages and coordinates multi-disciplinary IPM research. He has more than 20 years experience studying insect biodiversity conservation, insect-plant interactions, biology of natural enemies, biological control, landscape management for enhancing functional biodiversity, and developing IPM strategies.
Prof. Giovanni Dinelli (PhD), is a leading scientist in plant physiology with particular emphasis on secondary metabolite production (polyphenols, phytoestrogens, glucosinolates) as affected by agronomic managements, environmental conditions and abiotic stresses. He has long experience in weed biology and study of gene flow between crops and wild relatives.
Prof Mario Marini, His current research is on ecology and conservation of flora and fauna. This includes issues in ecology, butterfly and moth systematic, molecular systematic of insects of economic importance, biodiversity and food webs and developing European data sets on potential gene flow and the ecological impacts of biotech crops in protected areas.
Dr Ilaria Marotti (PhD) has a broad experience in the study of genomics and transcriptomics of plant metabolism. She is skilled with study of weed physiology, population dynamics, and insect-plant interactions.