Francesca Di Rosa
+39 06 49255124
francesca.dirosa@cnr.it
https://www.ibpm.cnr.it/go/francesca-di-rosa

Institute
Institute of Molecular Biology and Pathology (IBPM)
c/o Department of Molecular Medicine, Sapienza University
Viale Regina Elena 291 – 00161 Roma 
https://www.ibpm.cnr.it

Gabriele Favaretto, Technician (flow cytometry)

Dr. Di Rosa’s research activity deals with the induction and the maintenance of immunological memory by CD8 T cells, a leukocyte subset controlling intracellular infections and tumors.

Dr. Di Rosa’s group has demonstrated that the capacity of CD8 T cells to migrate to the bone marrow (BM) and assume long-term residence in this organ is a key aspect of memory. Current research interests are:

1) to better understand the functional and molecular differences between memory CD8 T cells from the BM and those from lymphoid periphery (blood, spleen, lymph nodes, etc);

2) to compare different vaccination protocols for their capacity to induce long-lived CD8 T cell memory.

Dr. Di Rosa has always been committed to science outreach. Recently she was leader of the following exhibits: “Fascination with diversity in immunology” (original title: “Immunologia, il fascino della diversità”), at the CNR, Rome, Italy (2023); “Vaccination, a time machine”, at the Royal Society Summer Exhibition, London, UK (2024).

• Di Rosa, F. (2024). Using art and history to communicate immunology to a broad audience.. Nat Rev Immunol. doi:10.1038/s41577-024-01090-w
• Natalini, A., Simonetti, S., Favaretto, G., Lucantonio, L., Peruzzi, G., Muñoz-Ruiz, M., . . . Di Rosa, F. (2023). Improved memory CD8 T cell response to delayed vaccine boost is associated with a distinct molecular signature. Frontiers in Immunology, 14. doi:10.3389/fimmu.2023.1043631
• Monin, L., Laing, A. G., Muñoz-Ruiz, M., McKenzie, D. R., del Molino del Barrio, I., Alaguthurai, T., . . . Irshad, S. (2021). Safety and immunogenicity of one versus two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine BNT162b2 for patients with cancer: interim analysis of a prospective observational study. The Lancet Oncology, 22(6), 765-778. doi:10.1016/S1470-2045(21)00213-8
• Laing, A. G., Lorenc, A., del Molino del Barrio, I., Das, A., Fish, M., Monin, L., . . . Hayday, A. C. (2020). A dynamic COVID-19 immune signature includes associations with poor prognosis. Nature Medicine, 26(10), 1623-1635. doi:10.1038/s41591-020-1038-6
• Simonetti, S., Natalini, A., Folgori, A., Capone, S., Nicosia, A., Santoni, A., & Di Rosa, F. (2019). Antigen-specific CD8 T cells in cell cycle circulate in the blood after vaccination. Scandinavian Journal of Immunology, 89(2). doi:10.1111/sji.12735

Cytofluorimetry facility, in collaboration with Gabriele Favaretto

Collaborators at IBPM, CNR: Fabrizio Antonangeli, Researcher
Dr Di Rosa is Visiting Scientist at the Francis Crick Institute, London, UK. https://www.crick.ac.uk/research/find-a-researcher/francesca-di-rosa
She has a long standing collaboration with Prof. Adrian Hayday, Francis Crick Institute, London; King’s College, London, UK