Foto del docente

Paola Ceroni

Full Professor

Department of Chemistry "Giacomo Ciamician"

Academic discipline: CHIM/03 General and Inorganic Chemistry

Curriculum vitae

Paola Ceroni (born 1971) got her laurea (cum laude) in chemistry at the University of Bologna in 1995: thesis on photophysics of molecular knots, advisor Prof. Vincenzo Balzani. She got the PhD in Chemical Sciences at the University of Bologna in 1998, working under the supervision of Prof. Sergio Roffia in the field of electrochemistry and spectroelectrochemistry of molecular and supramolecular systems. She was a visiting scientist in the laboratory of Prof. Allen J. Bard at the University of Texas at Austin (USA), financially supported by a grant from NATO Supramolecular Special Programme. She got research fellowships to work at CNR (Institute of Photochemistry and High Energy Radiation, Bologna) and in the Photochemistry and Supramolecular Chemistry group directed by Prof. Vincenzo Balzani.

Since 2001 she has a permanent position at the University of Bologna, Department of Chemistry “Giacomo Ciamician”: she is currently full professor in inorganic chemistry.

In 2015 she was visiting professor in the laboratory of Prof. Sergei Vinogradov (University of Pennsylvania, US, three months) for the development of phosphorescent probes by two-photon excitation.

Her current research interests are focused on luminescent silicon nanocrystlas, molecular and supramolecular systems for artificial photosynthesis and photocatalysis.

Her research on luminescent silicon nanocrystals was funded by an ERC Starting Grant PhotoSi (2012-2017) and an ERC Proof of Concept SiNBiosys (2017-2019).

 

Publications and conferences

She published about 200 research papers on international peer-reviewed journals, comprising review articles and book chapters.

She is co-author of a book entitled: “Photochemistry and Photophysics: Concepts, Research, Applications”, Wiley-VCH, 2014.

She is also co-editor of the following books: “Electrochemistry of Functional Supramolecular Systems” (2010, Wiley), “Designing Dendrimers” (2012, Wiley) “The Exploration of Supramolecular Systems and Nanostructures by Photochemical Techniques” (Lecture Notes in Chemistry, 2012, Springer).

She was invited to give about 40 lectures at national or international conferences and university and research institutes abroad. She attended about 70 conferences, most of which were international conferences and she presented oral contributions.

 

Research projects

Ongoing projects

H2020-RIA (2020-2024) as the European Coordinator of a project entitled: “Combined sun-driven oxidation and CO2 reduction for renewable energy storage” (CONDOR)

- Innovative Training Network (ITN) (2021-2024) as coordinator of the Bologna research unit of a project entitled: “Photocatalysis as a tool for synthetic organic chemistry” (PhotoReact)

- Bilateral Project Italy-Japan (2021-2023) as coordinator of the Bologna research unit; title of the project: “Artificial Photosynthesis” (national coordinator: Prof. Sebastiano Campagna)

 

Previous research projects:

  • ERC Proof of Concept Grant (2018-2019): as the Principal Investigator of a project entitled "Luminescent silicon nanocrystals as bioimaging systems"(SiNBioSys)

  • ERC Starting Grant (2012-2017) as the Principal Investigator of a project entitled “Silicon nanocrystals coated by photoactive molecules: a new class of organic-inorganic hybrid materials for solar energy conversion” (PhotoSi)

  • ENI research collaboration on “Luminescent solar concentrators based on silicon nanocrystals” (2018-2020)

  • Vinci Program (2015-2018) with Prof. Marc Gingras (University of Marseille, France)

  • ITN Project (2016-2020) PHOTOTRAIN, vice-coordinator of the project

  • Bilateral Project Italy-Japan (2017-2019), coordinator of the Bologna research unit

  • Bilateral Project Italy- USA (2014-2016), PI
  • FIRB “Futuro in ricerca” (2012-2014) SUPRACARBON, coordinator of the Bologna research unit
  • Marie Curie International Incoming Fellowships (2011-2013) Ln-DENDRI-Pols, PI
  • Vinci Programme 2009 of the Italian-French University
  • PRIN 2008 as coordinator of the Bologna research unit
  • Bilateral project Italy – China (2010-2012), PI

She was also involved in national and international projects, as FIRB 2011 NANOSOLAR, IIT 2011-2014, PRIN 2010-2011 HI-PHUTURE

Prizes and awards

  • “G. Semerano” Award from the Italian Chemical Society (1995).
  • Prize S.I.R.R. (Società Italiana per le Ricerche sulle Radiazioni) in2000.
  • Griess Lectureship from the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2015.

Memberships

- Board of the PhD school in Chemistry at the University of Bologna since 2010.

- Steering and Scientific Committee of the Interuniversity Research Centre for the Chemical Conversion of Solar Energy (SOLARCHEM), founded in 2009 together with Prof. Franco Scandola (University of Ferrara), and Prof. Sebastiano Campagna (University of Messina).

- AcademiaNet - Expert Database of Outstanding Female Scientists since 2012, appointed by the European Research Council.

- Advisory Board of Chem (Cell Press), Lecture Notes in Chemistry (Springer), Journal of Physical Organic Chemistry (Wiley), CrystEngComm (Royal Society of Chemistry) e Nanoscale Horizons (Royal Society of Chemistry).

- Associate Editor of Dalton Transactions (Royal Society of Chemistry).

 

Referee activity

  • She has refereed numerous national and international proposals: ERC, Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (European Commission), COST (European Commission), U.S. Department of Energy (DOE; US), Irish Research Council (Ireland), Research Grants Council (Hong-Kong), OPUS (Polish National Science Center), International Center for Frontier Research in Chemistry (Strasbourg, France), Labex Chemistry of Complex Systems (France), Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR, France), LUMOMAT Foundation (France), The German Israeli Foundation for scientific research and development, MIUR projects (PRIN, FIRB, SIR), strategical proposals (University of Padua and Trieste), Fondazione Cariparo (Italy).
  • She acts as a referee for the following journals: Angewandte Chemie International Edition, Journal of the American Chemical Society, Advanced Materials, Advanced Functional Materials, Chem, Nature Communications, Chemistry a European Journal, Chemistry an Asian Journal, Inorganic Chemistry, Dalton Transaction, Journal of Physical Chemistry, ChemPhysChem, European Journal of Inorganic Chemistry, Inorganica Chimica Acta, Macromolecules, Tetrahedron, Journal of Materials Chemistry, Australian Journal of Chemistry.

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