Università di Pisa

The University of Pisa (UNIPI) is a public institution, nowadays representing a modern and prestigious facility of advanced teaching and research with 20 departments, 17 libraries and 13 museums, besides to 26 centers to carry out the most solid research in all disciplinary areas (e.g. agriculture, medicine, biology, pharmacy, veterinary, computer science, engineering, astrophysics). UNIPI offers 61 undergraduate courses (first cycle), 71 master’s degree courses (second cycle) and 7 single-cycle degree courses, together with 36 PhD courses, 49 specialization courses and 67 one-year master’s courses. The mission of UNIPI is to provide excellent research, education and learning to generate knowledge, also away of academic backgrounds, thus contributing to the overall social and economic development.

Projects range from frontier research to technological development, from exploitation of research results to innovation development. National and Regional projects: in the period 2017-2021 UNIPI has received around €44 million in funding for a total of 380 projects. The main funding comes from the Ministry of Universities and Research (MUR), other Ministries, Tuscany Region, Foundations and other public and private bodies. In particular, UNIPI has obtained 35 European projects (Horizon Europe, Horizon 2020, PRIMA, SUSFOOD2, CORE Organic Cofunds/SUSFOOD2) focused on global sustainability and food quality and nutrition, for a total of approximately €10 million in the last 10 years.

In this proposal researchers from a variety of sectors (agricultural chemistry, nutraceuticals, agroeconomics, rural development, pharmaceutical, genetics) are included. The most striking example of interdisciplinarity in UNIPI on the topics of PE10 is the Nutrafood Centre, the interdepartmental research centre aimed at creating collaboration among all researchers working in the field of food, nutrition, nutraceutics and health. 10 departments and 170 researchers are involved in the centre's activities. The capacity of the UNIPI selected team to mitigate problems evolving during the development of research activities is clearly deducible by the vast number of successful competitive projects finalised (see section 2), in all of which detailed risks and contingency plans were described and, in some cases, successfully applied. The team has also shown a great capacity in problem solving attitudes in the framework of the several contacts and research activities with private institutions, where the food industry has many times involved UNIPI unique competences to overcome technological, chemical and biological issues that had unexpectedly arisen.

Furthermore, it is an active member of many of the most important EU initiatives acting in fields related to PE10, like: European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) where UNIPI is an Art. 36 listed institution, International Platform of Insects for Food and Feed (IPIFF) where UNIPI is an academic member, etc. Furthermore, UNIPI is a member of two National Clusters: Agrifood Nazionale (CL.A.N) and Spring (Sustainable Processes and Resources for Innovation and National Growth). Strategic national, European and international scientific collaborations have been developed by participating in national and European projects (see point 2 above), thanks to the 195 collaboration agreements in the field of AgriFood signed between UNIPI and other universities and thanks to a large number of national/international private/ public institutions (e.g. INRAE, CNR, The James Hutton Institute, FAO, etc.) and SMEs/industries (e.g. NGN- NEW GENERATION NUTRACEUTICALS- HEALTHCARE, S.R.L. , GRG Gene Technology SA, React4Life s.r.l., IVTech s.r.l., Qualivita S.r.l. Siena, Consorzio di Tutela dell’Aceto Balsamico di Modena IGP, Modena; Consorzio tutela Pecorino Toscano DOP, Grosseto, Consorzio Parmigiano Reggiano, Reggio Emilia).