Associate Professor at the University of Bologna since 2018, she conducts her research in the field of experimental particle physics. Her scientific interests focus in particular on precision measurements of the Standard Model, the study of vector boson production in association with heavy-flavour jets, Higgs boson physics, luminosity measurements in high-energy physics experiments, and the development of innovative detectors.
She has been affiliated with the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics, INFN, and has collaborated with CERN since 2001. Since 2005, she has been a member of the ATLAS Collaboration at the Large Hadron Collider, where she has held scientific responsibilities in data analysis, detector calibration, and the production and review of the Collaboration’s scientific results. She coordinates the Bologna unit of the PRIN2022 project BE PROUD – BEauty PRObes of qUantum chromoDynamics, devoted to the study of vector boson production in association with heavy-flavour jets.
Alongside her scientific work, she promotes science communication, transferable skills, and public engagement. She is co-founder and co-director of the Officina di Narrazione della Scienza and chairs the Third Mission Committee of the Department of Physics and Astronomy.
Education
She graduated in Physics from the University of Bologna in 2000, receiving the highest distinction, and obtained her PhD in Physics from the same university in 2004, with a thesis carried out within the OBELIX Collaboration at CERN. In 1999, she attended the Summer Student School at Fermilab, Chicago, within the CDF experiment.
Academic career
From 2004 to 2010, she worked as a research fellow at the Department of Physics of the University of Bologna. In 2010, she held a fixed-term researcher position at INFN and, in the same year, became a researcher at the Department of Physics and Astronomy of the University of Bologna.
In 2012, she obtained the Italian National Scientific Qualification for Associate Professor in the field of Experimental Physics of Fundamental Interactions. Since 2018, she has been Associate Professor at the Department of Physics and Astronomy “Augusto Righi” of the University of Bologna.
In 2024–2025, she was Visiting Fellow at Clare Hall College and at the Department of High Energy Physics of the Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge. She is a Life Member of Clare Hall College.
Teaching activity
Since 2001, she has been continuously involved in teaching activities in the Degree Programmes in Physics and Engineering at the University of Bologna, at undergraduate, master’s and doctoral level.
She has supervised bachelor’s, master’s and PhD theses on experimental particle physics, data analysis, precision measurements, and Large Hadron Collider physics. She was a member of the PhD Board in Science and Technologies for Cultural Heritage and is currently a member of the PhD Board in Physics.
In her teaching and tutoring activities, she combines disciplinary training with the development of methodological and communication skills, with particular attention to students’ autonomy, their ability to work in international and interdisciplinary contexts, and the conscious construction of their academic and professional paths.
Scientific activity
She has taken part in several international experiments at CERN and DESY, including OBELIX, LHCb, HERA-B and ATLAS. Her research activity has developed along two main lines: data analysis in particle physics experiments and the development, characterization and calibration of detectors for high-energy physics experiments.
Within the ATLAS Collaboration, she has worked on luminosity measurements using the LUCID detector, on W and Z boson production cross-section measurements, on Drell–Yan processes, and on vector boson production in association with heavy-flavour jets. She has also contributed to Higgs boson studies, in particular in channels involving decays into b quarks.
In recent years, she has also started a research line devoted to the search for long-lived particles, predicted by several new physics scenarios, developing strategies based on time-of-flight and energy-loss measurements in the ATLAS muon spectrometer.
She is the scientific coordinator of the Bologna unit of the PRIN2022 project BE PROUD, dedicated to the study of W/Z vector boson production in association with heavy-flavour jets in proton-proton collisions at the LHC. The project combines experimental measurements, Monte Carlo validation, the study of systematic uncertainties, and the development of new techniques for the identification of b-jets, including Machine Learning methods.
She is co-author of more than 1,200 scientific publications in international peer-reviewed journals and of several monographs related to large experimental collaborations.
Institutional activities and academic appointments
Since 2020, she has chaired the Third Mission Committee of the Department of Physics and Astronomy of the University of Bologna. Since 2021, she has been co-founder and co-director of the Officina di Narrazione della Scienza, a university initiative dedicated to science storytelling and the communication of scientific research.
She has been a member of the Board of the Department of Physics and Astronomy and of departmental committees for the selection of postdoctoral researchers, scholarship holders and tutors. She has also contributed to the European project PLOTINA, aimed at promoting gender balance and inclusion in research, innovation and training.
Within the ATLAS Collaboration, she has served in the ATLAS Physics Office, contributing to the management, review and submission of scientific publications. Since 2025, she has been an elected member of the ATLAS Speakers Committee.
Outreach and public engagement
She is actively involved in science outreach and public engagement activities addressed to students, schools, the general public and the academic community. She coordinates and contributes to university and departmental initiatives aimed at promoting scientific culture, students’ talents and the dialogue between research and society.
In 2022, she served as Outreach Coordinator and member of the Scientific Secretariat of the international conference ICHEP. Since 2021, she has been a member of the ATLAS Italia Outreach Committee. She has also contributed to the organization of national and international scientific conferences, including LHCP and the Congress of the Italian Physical Society.
Membership of scientific collaborations and committees
She has been a member of the ATLAS Collaboration at CERN since 2005. Previously, she participated in the OBELIX and LHCb Collaborations at CERN and in the HERA-B Collaboration at DESY. She has also taken part in INFN-funded detector research and development projects, including SLIM5, VIPIX, ELOFLEX and FIRE.
She serves as a referee for international scientific journals, including European Physical Journal C, and for national research projects. In 2020, she received the recognition of distinguished referee from EPJ.
Awards and recognitions
In 2005, she received the Italian Physical Society Award for scientific activity. As a member of the ATLAS Collaboration, she shared major international recognitions connected to the discovery and study of the Higgs boson, including the European Physical Society High Energy and Particle Physics Prize and the Princess of Asturias Award for Technical and Scientific Research.
In 2025, the ATLAS Collaboration received the Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics for its achievements in precision measurements of the Higgs boson properties, the study of rare processes, and the exploration of nature at the smallest distances accessible at CERN.
Other activities
She integrates research, teaching and science communication through initiatives dedicated to science storytelling, transferable skills and the enhancement of students’ academic and professional development. As a tutor, she aims to provide scientific, methodological and communication skills that foster autonomy, interdisciplinarity, critical thinking and effective communication.
