معرفی
Dr. Francesca Ceroni is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Chemical Engineering at Imperial College London, part of the Faculty of Engineering. She holds affiliations with the Centre for Synthetic Biology, the CRUK Convergence Science Centre, and the UKRI Artificial Intelligence for Engineering Biology Consortium, among others. Her research focuses on synthetic biology, host-aware cell engineering, and the integration of computational biology with AI for synthetic design. She has developed tools to mitigate cellular burden in engineered systems and pioneered work on synthetic cells for therapeutic applications.
Dr. Ceroni earned her BSc, MRes, and PhD in Bioengineering from the University of Bologna. Her postdoctoral training included a Visiting Research Fellowship at Harvard Medical School and roles at Imperial College London, where she became a Junior Research Fellow in 2016. Her work bridges engineering principles with biological systems, emphasizing ethical and biosecurity considerations in synthetic biology.
Her research spans six core areas: host-aware engineering of mammalian and bacterial cells, computational biology/AI-driven design, engineered synthetic cells, gene expression control, and biosecurity governance. Key contributions include identifying resource competition in engineered cells and developing non-invasive assays for cell growth characterization. Her team collaborates with industry partners like AZ and Bayer to translate findings into biomedical applications.
- Education:
- BSc in Pharmaceutical Biotechnologies, University of Bologna (2001–2004)
- MRes in Bioengineering, University of Bologna (2004–2007)
- PhD in Bioengineering, University of Bologna (2008–2011)
Dr. Ceroni has been recognized with the 2016 Junior Research Fellowship from Imperial College London. Her work is published in high-impact journals like Nature Communications, Nature Reviews Bioengineering, and Science, with a focus on advancing synthetic biology’s technical and ethical dimensions.
