Dr. Michael Alexanian serves as an Assistant Investigator at the Gladstone Institutes and holds the position of Assistant Professor within the UCSF Department of Pediatrics. His academic journey spans multiple continents. Alexanian received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Florence in Italy. After he graduated, Alexanian moved to the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute in Melbourne, Australia. There, the exposure to the field of epigenetics shaped his subsequent academic pursuits, inspiring him to delve deeper into the intricate mechanisms governing gene regulation within our cells. Alexanian returned to Europe for a PhD degree in stem cell biology at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland. He then moved to U.S. for his postdoctoral training at the Gladstone Institutes where his research pinpointed novel genes dictating fibrotic processes in heart failure. Establishing his laboratory in 2022 within the Gladstone Institutes, Dr. Alexanian spearheads a research group dedicated to unraveling the genetic and epigenetic mechanisms influencing how cardiac cells change form and function in heart failure, promoting disease progression. The Alexanian Lab is interested in dissecting the gene-level changes that underlie this effect, in order to design targeted therapies to preserve or restore heart function.

Lorenzo Rosa is a Principal Investigator at Carnegie Institution for Science. Lorenzo is also an Assistant Professor (by courtesy) at Stanford University. Prior to joining Carnegie, he was a postdoctoral fellow in the Institute of Energy and Process Engineering at ETH Zurich. He holds a Ph.D. in Environmental Science from University of California Berkeley, and a B.S. and M.S. in Environmental Engineering from Politecnico di Milano, Italy. His research aims to assess the potential benefits and unintended climate and environmental consequences of innovations engineered to satisfy the increasing global demands for energy, water, and food. Dr. Rosa was awarded the 2019 American Geophysical Union (AGU) Horton Hydrology Research grant and the 2021 AGU Science for Solutions Award. He was also listed among the most influential young leaders in Science and Technology of 2020 by Forbes 30 Under 30. Dr. Rosa is an avid sportsman, when he is not at his desk, you can find him running, cycling, swimming, and skiing. Website: lorenzorosa.com

Domenico Imparato is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Global Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley, USA, and the University of Hamburg, Germany. Originally from Italy, he received his Ph.D. in Law from the Alma Mater Studiorum - University of Bologna. He was then a DAAD Postdoctoral Sponsored Researcher at the University of Oxford, Saïd Business School, UK. Domenico’s academic work lies at the crossroads of international finance, corporate governance, and tax policy within the ever-evolving landscape of capital markets. His research encompasses diverse areas such as alternative asset management and private equity, family businesses, public corporations, venture capital, tech and growth companies.