Epilepsy and Treatment

Biography

Annamaria Vezzani obtained her PhD degree in Neuropharmacology in Milano at the Mario Negri Institure for Pharmacological Research. She spent her post-doctoral period at the Univeristy of Maryland in Baltimore working on the mechanisms of seizures generation in experimental models of epilepsy. Additional post-doctoral periods were done at the Univeristy of Stockholm and at the Karolinska Institute. She was on sabbatical at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in 2002 in the laboratory of Developmental Epilepsy. She studies the biochemical and molecular mechanisms involved in the pathogenesis of seizures and epileptogenesis using experimental models. The present research is focused on the role of neuroactive inflammatory mediators in aberrant neuronal excitability underlying seizures. Focus of research is also on the mechanisms of pharmacoresistance. She has published over 160 original papers, several book chapters and reviewes in peer-reviewed high impact scientific journals (h-index 62). Since 1997 she is Head of the Laboratory of Experimental Neurology in the Department of Neuroscience at the Mario Negri Institute for Pharmacological Research, Milan, Italy. She is member of the Editorial Board variuos scientific journals includingf Epilepsy Res, Epilepsy and Treatments and Neuroscience, and she has been for 8 years Associate Editor of Basic Science for Epilepsia. She has been appointed of the Chair of the Commission on Neurobiology of International League Against Epilepsy (2005-2009) which is promoting initiatives for improving translational research in epilepsy. She is now liason member of the Commission on Neurobiology and active member of the CEA of the ILAE and various AES committees. She received the Research Recognition Award for translational research in 2009 by the American Epilepsy Society.

Research Interest

Neuropharmacology,Experimental Neurology,Translational Research in Epilepsy