I am a permanent researcher at Council for Agricultural Research and Economics, Agriculture and Environment Research Center, CREA-AA Bari, Italy. I am an agronomist with a Ph.D. in Mediterranean Agronomy.

My research activities are mainly focused on: organic agriculture; agroecology; sustainable agriculture and circular economy; waste recycling by composting, and compost application; soil fertility; adaptation of horticultural crops to climate change, sustainability evaluation. Author of more than 100 publications, 58 of which are listed in Scopus.

In the Bio4Food project my role is leading the CREA team, planning and monitoring the collection of selected crop residues (tomato, fennel, basil, parsley and artichoke), their transformation into biofertilizers by on-farm composting (carried out in the pilot plant of CREA’s experimental farm) and application of compost and bioactive plant extracts both in field and pot experiments, under organic cultivation conditions, to determine soil quality and evaluate biostimulant/biopesticide and biofortification effects.