Her main research activities focus on sustainable pest management, insect biodiversity and ecosystem services. She is studying the role of habitat management in protecting and promoting functional biodiversity at different spatial scales (farm & landscape level) with particular emphasis on the importance of polyphagous predators in controlling pest outbreaks. This relationship between natural enemies boosting and vegetation complexity represents one of the most important keystones of agroecology and it was also the main theme of my research activities. The introduction of ecological infrastructures (e.g., cover crops, wildflower strips) within an agricultural landscape can be considered essential to provide resources and shelters to natural enemies, especially in depleted habitats where pressure by external non-renewable input is intense.
She has also studied alternative strategies to mitigate the effects of intensive agriculture on natural enemies, such as the application of biological control strategies to control pests and the use of soil and canopy arthropods as bioindicators of land use.
She has worked on several taxa, focusing in particular on rove beetles (Coleoptera Staphylinidae), hoverflies (Diptera Syrphidae) and solitary bees (Hymenoptera Apoidea).
