| Biographical Info |
GIUSEPPE CHIRICO is currently professor of Applied Physics at the University of Milano-Bicocca (Dep. of Physics, School of Sciences). His activity is at the edge between biophysics and photonics, with a strong interdisciplinary flavor. He spent a postdoc at the European Molecular Laboratory Laboratory in Grenoble (F) in 1990 on Neutron Scattering from DNA and at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg in 1993 on Brownian Dynamics of Chromatin. GC has been then visiting professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Laboratory for Fluorescence Dynamics in 2000. Since 2000 GC has grown interests in nanotechnology applied to biophysics and medical physics developing nanosensors for proteins (p53 for example) based on the use of gold nanoparticles. Active projects deal with gold non-spherical nanoparticles and their use as localized thermo-loaders for hyperthermia and temperature triggered drug release. GC is coordinating the Biospectroscopy Laboratory at the Physics Dept. and is the group leader of the Biophotonics group in the same department. The group is developing photo- and fluorescence correlation spectroscopies and applies them to study the structure and dynamics of proteins and nanoparticles interacting with cells. In-vivo deep tissue imaging is performed through a dedicated two-photon excitation microscope. Part of the research of GC is also devoted to numerical simulation of complex polymeric systems: supercoiled DNA, DNA chromatin, lymph node chemotaxis and red blood cells in capillaries.
GC was member of the scientific committee of the biophysics section of INFM (Istituto Nazionale per la Fisica della Materia) in the years 1998-2002, and of the Societa’ Italiana di Biofisica Pura e Applicata (SIBPA; years 2008-2012); Editor for PLOSONE and Journal of Biophysics (Hindawi) and member of the Editorial Board of Current Bio-nanotehnology (Bentham Science Publishers). Since 2009 GC coordinates the graduate school in Physics and Astronomy and the training courses for the high school teachers in Physics. He is also responsible of LABEX, a laboratory in Modern Physics dedicated to high school pupils.
G.C. has published more than 130 papers in peer reviewed international journals and has been PI and coordinator of projects on Optical Microscopy and Spectroscopy and bio-nanophotonics.
Recent projects.
• Construction and read out of 2D networks of fluorescent molecules by AFM: towards molecular optical memories (2008-2012), Cariplo Foundation, Italy.
• Gold nanorods (NR) and asymmetric nanoparticles (ANP) capped with a biocompatible polymer bearing binding groups for molecules and metal cations: pharmacological and thermal antimicrobial action activated by near-IR irradiation (2012-2014) , Cariplo Foundation, Italy.
• ENCITE: European Network for Cell Imaging and Tracking Expertise (FP7: Cooperation Health-2007-1.2-4, Grant agreement No: 201842, EU), on the study of the interactions between DC and NK cells in vivo by multiphoton intravital microscopy.
• Raman Microscopy for Biomedical Applications (2010-2014), Regione Lombardia (I). |
