Maria Rescigno is full professor, vice-rector and delegate to research at Humanitas University and group leader at Humanitas Research hospital in Milan. She graduated in Biology in the University of Milan and received her PhD in Pharmacology and toxicology. She served as a group leader at the European Institute of Oncology, a professor at the University of Milan, and a visiting professor at the University of Oslo. She was post-doctoral researcher at the University of Cambridge, UK, and earned her PhD from the CNR in Milan.

Prof. Rescigno was elected EMBO Young Investigator in 2007, became an EMBO member in 2011, and joined the EMBO Council in 2019, EMBO chair from 2023 onwards. She has received three ERC grants and has authored 221 publications. She has also received several awards, including an honorable mention (2022), the Roma Prize (2022), the Fondazione De Sanctis for Social Health Award (2023), and The Pezcoller-Marina Larcher Fogazzaro-EACR Women in Cancer Research Award (2023). In 2016, she founded the startup Postbiotica, a spin-off of the University of Milan that exploits microbiota-derived metabolites as new pharmaceutical agents.

Seminar topic: Microbiota in the gut-liver-brain axis