CHIECHIO SANTINA

Professore Associato

Orari di ricevimento

Martedì e giovedì dalle ore 11:00 alle ore 12:00. Tutti i giorni previo appuntamento

Curriculum

Personal Information
Name: Santina Chiechio
Phone: +39 0957384027
Email: chiechio@unict.it

Current Position:

Associate Professor of Pharmacology

Education:

10/2001: Speciality in Clinical Pharmacy, University of Catania, Italy
10/1995 Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Catania, Italy
11/1990 BS in Pharmacy, University of Catania, Italy

Bibliographic Index: updated to 2022, March, 29

Author of 51 publications in international peer-reviewed journals and 1 book chapter
Scopus H-index=27; Total citations: 1623

Positions and Honors
June 1994 - Dec. 1995 Fellow Institute of “Psichobiologie des Comportements Adaptatifs” INSERM U.269, University of Bordeaux II, France
April 1996 - Dec. 1997 Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology Center CNR (National Research Council) Milan, Italy

Jan. 2001 – May 2003 Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Catania, Italy
June 2003 – Jan. 2004 Postdoctoral Fellow, Division of Neuroscience, Baylor College of
Medicine, Houston, TX, USA
Feb. 2004 – June 2006 Senior Scientist , Pain Center, Department of Anesthesiology, Washington
University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO, USA
Oct. 2007 - Oct. 2015 Assistant Professor, Department of Drug Sciences - Section of Pharmacology and Toxicology, Unversity of Catania, Italy
Oct. 2015 – Present Associate Professor, Department of Drug Sciences - Section of Pharmacology and Toxicology, Unversity of Catania, Italy
2019 – Present Associate Researcher, Oasi Research Institute-IRCCS, troina EN, Italy
2019 – Present Member of the Research Committee of the University of Catania, Italy.
2020 – Present OPBA Scientific Member of OPBA (Committee for Animal Care) of University of Catania, Italy


Other Experience and Professional Memberships
2006- 2008 Professor of “Principles of Toxicology", Department of Drug Sciences, University of Catania, Italy
2008- present Professor of "General Toxicology", Department of Drug Sciences, University of Catania, Italy
2012- 2017 Professor of "Toxicology", Department of Drug Sciences, University of Catania, Italy
2018-Present Professor of “Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapy” Department of Drug and Health Sciences, University of Catania, Italy
2002- present Member, Society for Neuroscience
2012- present Member, International Association for the Study of Pain


Major Honors
2008 Award from University of Catania for research at Pain Center, School of Medicine, Department of Anesthesiology, Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, USA
2011 Invited speaker - SUMMER SCHOOL OF NEUROSCIENCE Catania, Italy
2012 Invited Speaker - 14TH WORLD CONGRESS ON PAIN, International Association for the Study of Pain
2012 Invited Speaker - SINS Congress 2012 Catania, Italy
Contribution to Science

Behavioral pharmacology applied to the study of memory and pain

My most recent work has been focused on the study of mechanism underlying the development of pain hypersensitivity and in particular the epigenetic regulation of metabotropic glutamate receptor type-2 (mGluR2) and its relevance in the modulation of chronic pain. It is well known that mGluR2 are involved in pain transmission and in the establishment of pain hypersensitivity in chronic pain models.

In addition to the contributions described above, I've been also interested in studying the analgesic activity of antidepressant drugs and, in particular, the role of serotonin and norepinefrine in the analgesic efficacy of different antidepressant belonging to different classes such as tricyclic antidepressant (TCA) o selective serotonin reuptacke inhibitors (SSRI) by using Lmx1b conditional knock-out mice (Lmx1bf/f/p), which lack serotonin (5-HT) neurons in the CNS. These studies report that the analgesic effects of various antidepressant drugs are differentially dependent on the central 5-HT system.

Finally, over the years I've been also involved in studies of mechanisms which cause synaptic dysfunction and neuronal loss in models of Alzheimer's disease (AD), the most frequent yet incurable type of dementia, by combining in vitro and in vivo studies. In particular, these studies have been focused on the role of insulin-like growth factor 1 receptor (IGF-IR) signaling. These studies suggest that IGF-IR pathway contributes to AD progression.