Chiara Romano

E-mail: c.romano@unisg.it

University of Gastronomic Sciences | Pollenzo Campus
Piazza Vittorio Emanuele, 9
fraz. Pollenzo – 12042 Bra (Cn) – Italy

BIOGRAPHY

Chiara is a marine biologist and ecologist with a Ph.D. in Animal Biology carried out at the University of Palermo (Italy) and over 16 years of post-doctoral research experience in benthic ecology and biodiversity.

Before joining the University of Gastronomic Sciences, she has been working in some of the most prestigious research institutes: the CNR and the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn in Italy; the Plymouth Marine Laboratory in the UK, the Centre d’Estudis Avancats de Blanes, (CEAB-CSIC) in Spain and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in California, USA.

The focus of her scientific career is the study of marine fauna – in particular Mollusca Bivalvia and Annelida Polychaeta – and how perturbations (either natural or anthropogenic) affect species distribution and biodiversity.

Her main research interests and expertise concern:

biodiversity assessment using the approach of integrative taxonomy (combining morphological and molecular data) for species delimitation;
experimental and quantitative ecology to evaluate the response of organisms to the disturbance or anthropogenic impact;
phylogenetic and phylogeographic analyses to answer ecological questions;
population genetics (including Next generation sequencing) to study connectivity among populations and suggest nature conservation management options.

She has been involved in 19 national and international research projects, for some of them she was coordinator of the work packages relative to the study of benthic organisms and she was the PI responsible for a Marie Curie Project (DeepFall Project). She is author of 30 scientific publications in SCI journals and various articles for public divulgation. She was tutor of 25 university students in Italy, Spain and USA.