Sonia LeviFull Professor of Biology, School of Medicine, Vita-Salute San Raffaele University and Head of the Proteomic of Iron Metabolism Unit, Division of Neuroscience, DIBIT, IRCCS-OSR.
Education and training
1982-Milano-University of Milano-PhD in Biological Science
1982/1983- Milano- Department of Biomedical Science- HSR- Post –doctoral training
1984- Heidelberg- EMBL- EMBO fellow
1986/1989-Milano-Fondazione Centro San Raffaele del Monte Tabor-Post doctoral research
fellow
Employment
1989/2002- Fondazione Centro San Raffaele del Monte Tabor, Milano-Researcher
2003-present time- Fondazione Centro San Raffaele del Monte Tabor, Milano-Proteomic of
Iron Metabolism Unit-Head of the Unit.
2005-2019 Associate Professor of Biology, School of Medicine, Vita-Salute San Raffaele
University, Milano
2019-present time Full Professor of Biology, School of Medicine, Vita-Salute San Raffaele
University, Milano
2016- Member of the Top Italian Women Scientists
2016- Member of "100 expert women for science"
Scientific interest
She has a solid track record in iron metabolism and, in particular, a long experience in the
characterization of structure and function of ferritins, both in vitro and in cellular models. She
was involved in the first discovery of Mitochondrial ferritin, an iron storage protein localized in
mitochondria. She developed eucaryotic cellular models to overexpress iron proteins and
analyze their biological functions. Her recent research interest is focused to clarify the
relationship between iron and neurodegeneration. With this aim, she developed and studied
cellular and animal models of neurodegenerative disease, like neuroferritinophaty, PKAN and
Friedreich's ataxia. Recently, she has established human neuronal cellular models derived from
fibroblasts of PKAN and CoPAN affected patients by genetic reprogramming. These new
models represent a powerful in vitro model system in which to investigate pathogenetic
mechanisms and to identify possible therapeutic targets and to test in vitro efficacy of specific
compounds. She has previously administered projects funded by different agencies and
successfully collaborated with other researchers in multicenter research projects, this activity
produced several peer-reviewed publications from each project.
Scientific production
She is co-author of 134 papers published in international peer-reviewed journals and of 10
book chapters, Total Impact Factor =693,803 IF mean= 5,178, h-index Scopus=58, h-index
Google Scholar =62
Research duties (last 10 years)
2002-2006, FIRB-MIUR, Contractor for the project: Post-genomica del metabolismo del ferro.
2003- 2005, Fondazione Mariani, Unit of the project: Study the role of frataxin and ferritin in mitochondrial iron metabolism aimed at the development of new therapeutic approaches of Fridreich's ataxia. P.I. Prof. Paolo Arosio
2005-2008, P.I. of Telethon multicentric project: Functional and epidemiological study of neuroferritinopathies: implications for the role of iron in neurodegenerative disorders.
2007-2009, PRIN 2006-MIUR, Unit of the project: Characterization of new animal and cellular models for the study of disorders of iron homeostasis: the role of mitochondria and of heme metabolism. P.I. Prof. Paolo Arosio
2008-2010, Cariplo 2007- Unit of the project: Engineered Animal And Cellular Models To Dissect The Mechanisms of In Vivo Homing And Differentiation of Pluripotent Stem Cells, P. I. Prof. Ruggero Pardi
2010-2013, P.I. of one unit of Telethon multicentric project. Animal models of neuroferritinopathies for the study of the role of iron in neurodegeneration, Coordinator Prof. P.Arosio
2011-2012.- P.I. of AISNAF grant: Analisi del ruolo del ferro nella PKAN mediante lo sviluppo di nuovi modelli cellulari neuronali
2011-2014: Coordinator of Telethon multicentric project: The role of iron and mitochondria in the pathogenesis of Pantothenate Kinase Associated Neurodegeneration (PKAN): development of new neuronal cellular systems and analysis of a mouse model.
2014-2017- PI of AISNAF grant: Generation of induced pluripotent stem cells from patients' fibroblasts with different mutated genes causing NBIA.
2017-2020: Coordinator of Telethon multicentric project: Implementation of human neuronal cultures and mouse models of Pantothenate kinase 2 deficiency to investigate pathogenic mechanisms of iron-related neurodegeneration and evaluate Coenzyme A therapeutic
efficacy.
2018- Research contract with TM3 Therapeutics B.V., title: “The effects of treatment with TIM- 1803 in iPSC-derived neuronal models of PKAN”
2020- Research contract with Minoryx Therapeutics S.L., title:“Effects of MIN-102 in PKAN and NBIA disorders”
2021-2024: Telethon-PI of research project GGP20047 “Exploiting iron-burden astrocyte and mouse models to approach the therapy for PKAN and CoPAN.”
2022-2024: PI of one Unit of Cariplo Giovani 2021, “IRON homeostasis inNeuroferritinopathY: unravelling the molecular details of abnormal ferritin functionality (IRONYc)”, PI Dr. Flavio Dipisa.
Invited Presentation (most relevant)
2006- “Third International Friedreich's Ataxia Scientific Conference”, NIH, Bethesda, 10-12 November
2007- Gordon Research Conference 2007, “Cell Biology of Metal” Newport, 29 July -3 August
2008- “50th ASH meeting”, San Francisco, 6-9 December
2009- “Telethon Convention”, Riva del Garda, 9-11 March
2010- “Brain, Blood and Iron”, Bethesda, 1-2 October
2011- “16th Congress of EHA”, London, 8-12 June
2012- “NA-NBIA meeting
2012", Ede, 26-27 October
2013- "BioIron 2013" meeting, London, 14-18 April
2014- "China International Conference on Bio-Trace Elements (CICBE), Hangzhou, China, 6- 9 November
2015- “BioIron” Hangzhou, China, 8-10 September
2017- “6th International Symposium on NBIA & Related Disorders”, Stevenson,WA,USA,7-8 April
Publications (most recent selected peer-reviewed publications)
1. Levi S, Volonté MA. Iron chelation in early Parkinson's disease. Lancet Neurol. 2023 Apr;22(4):290-291. doi: 10.1016/S1474-4422(23)00039-X.
2. Ripamonti M, Santambrogio P, Racchetti G, Cozzi A, Di Meo I, Tiranti V, Levi S. PKAN hiPS-Derived Astrocytes Show Impairment of Endosomal Trafficking: A Potential Mechanism Underlying Iron Accumulation. Front Cell Neurosci. 2022 Jun
16;16:878103. doi: 10.3389/fncel.2022.878103.
3. Santambrogio P, Ripamonti M, Cozzi A, Raimondi M, Cavestro C, Di Meo I, Rubio A, Taverna S, Tiranti V, Levi S. Massive iron accumulation in PKAN-derived neurons and astrocytes: light on the human pathological phenotype. Cell Death Dis. 2022 Feb 25;13(2):185. doi: 10.1038/s41419-022-04626-x.
4. Santambrogio P, Ripamonti M, Paolizzi C, Panteghini C, Carecchio M, Chiapparini L, Raimondi M, Rubio A, Di Meo I, Cozzi A, Taverna S, De Palma G, Tiranti V, Levi S. Harmful Iron-Calcium Relationship in Pantothenate kinase Associated Neurodegeneration. Int J Mol Sci. 2020 May 22;21(10):3664. doi: 10.3390/ijms21103664.
5. Cozzi A, Orellana DI, Santambrogio P, Rubio A, Cancellieri C, Giannelli S, Ripamonti M, Taverna S, Di Lullo G, Rovida E, Ferrari M, Forni GL, Fiorillo C, Broccoli V, Levi S. Stem Cell Modeling of Neuroferritinopathy Reveals Iron as a Determinant of Senescence and Ferroptosis during Neuronal Aging. Stem Cell Reports. 2019 Nov 12;13(5):832-846. doi: 10.1016/j.stemcr.2019.09.002.
6. Levi S, Tiranti V. Neurodegeneration with Brain Iron Accumulation Disorders: Valuable Models Aimed at Understanding the Pathogenesis of Iron Deposition. Pharmaceuticals (Basel). 2019 Feb 9;12(1):27. doi: 10.3390/ph12010027. PMID: 30744104;
7. Wu Q, Wu WS, Su L, Zheng X, Wu WY, Santambrogio P, Gou YJ, Hao Q, Wang PN, Li YR, Zhao BL, Nie G, Levi S, Chang YZ. Mitochondrial Ferritin Is a Hypoxia- Inducible Factor 1α-Inducible Gene That Protects from Hypoxia-Induced Cell Death in Brain. Antioxid Redox Signal. 2019 Jan 10;30(2):198-212. doi:10.1089/ars.2017.7063.
8. Guaraldo Michela, Paolo Santambrogio, Elisabetta Rovelli, Augusta Di Savino, Giuseppe Saglio, Davide Cittaro, Antonella Roetto & Sonia Levi. Characterization of human mitochondrial ferritin promoter identification of transcription factors and evidences of epigenetic control. Sci. Rep. 6, 33432; doi: 10.1038/srep33432 (2016).
9. Orellana Di, Santambrogio P, Rubio A, Yekhlef L, Cancellieri C, Dusi S, Giannelli Sg, Venco P, Mazzara Pg, Cozzi A, Ferrari M, Garavaglia B, Taverna S, Tiranti V, Broccoli V, Levi S. Coenzyme a corrects pathological defects in human neurons of pank2-associated neurodegeneration. EMBO MOL MED. 2016 AUG 11.
10. ZoleaF,BiamonteF,CandeloroP,DiSanzoM,CozziA,DiVitoA,QuaresimaB, Lobello N, Trecroci F, Di Fabrizio E, Levi S, Cuda G, Costanzo F. 2015. H ferritin silencing induces protein misfolding in K562 cells: A Raman analysis. Free Radic Biol Med. 89:614-23.
11. SantambrogioP,DusiS,GuaraldoM,RotundoLI,BroccoliV,GaravagliaB,TirantiV, Levi S. 2015. Mitochondrial iron and energetic dysfunction distinguish fibroblasts and induced neurons from pantothenate kinase-associated neurodegeneration patients. Neurobiol Dis. 81:144-53
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12. LeviS,RovidaE.2015.Neuroferritinopathy:Fromferritinstructuremodificationto pathogenetic mechanism. Neurobiol Dis. 81:134-43.
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3. KoeppenAH,RamirezRL,BeckerAB,BjorkST,LeviS,SantambrogioP,ParsonsPJ, Kruger PC, Yang KX, Feustel PJ, Mazurkiewicz JE. 2015. The pathogenesis of cardiomyopathy in Friedreich ataxia. PLoS One. 10(3):e0116396.
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4. MaccarinelliF,PaganiA,CozziA,CodazziF,DiGiacomoG,CapocciaS,RapinoS, Finazzi D, Politi LS, Cirulli F, Giorgio M, Cremona O, Grohovaz F, Levi S. 2014. A novel neuroferritinopathy mouse model (FTL 498InsTC) shows progressive brain iron dysregulation, morphological signs of early neurodegeneration and motor coordination deficits. Neurobiol Dis. 81:119-33.
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5. LeviS,TaveggiaC.2014.Ironhomeostasisinperipheralnervoussystem,stillablack box? Antioxid Redox Signal. 21(4):634-48.
16. LeviS,FinazziD.2014Neurodegenerationwithbrainironaccumulation:updateon pathogenic mechanisms. Front Pharmacol. 5:99. eCollection 2014.
17. SanchezAM,PapaleoE,CortiL,SantambrogioP,LeviS,ViganòP,CandianiM, Panina- Bordignon P. 2014. Iron availability is increased in individual human ovarian follicles in close proximity to an endometrioma compared with distal ones. Hum Reprod. 29(3):577-83.
18. Al-QenaeiA,YiakouvakiA,ReelfsO,SantambrogioP,LeviS,HallND,TyrrellRM, Pourzand C. 2014. Role of intracellular labile iron, ferritin, and antioxidant defence in resistance of chronically adapted Jurkat T cells to hydrogen peroxide. Free Radic Biol Med. 68:87-100.
19. CozziA,SantambrogioP,PriviteraD,BroccoliV,RotundoLI,GaravagliaB,BenzR,
Altamura S, Goede JS, Muckenthaler MU, Levi S. 2013. Human L-ferritin deficiency is characterized by idiopathic generalized seizures and atipica restless leg syndrome. J Exp Med. 210(9):1779-91
20. InvernizziR,TravaglinoE,DellaPortaMG,GallìA,MalcovatiL,RostiV,Bergamaschi G, Erba BG, Bellistri F, Bastia R, Santambrogio P, Levi S, Cazzola M. 2013 Effects of mitochondrial ferritin overexpression in normal and sideroblastic erythroid progenitors. Br J Haematol. 161(5):726-37.