Dipartimento di Sanità pubblica

The University Department of Public Health was established with a vision of medicine focused on the concept of preventive health in living and working environments, on the study of bio-morphological and molecular disease mechanisms, on the management of health activities in medical diagnosis and therapy, in surgery and rehabilitation, in an interdisciplinary and social conception of Public Health.

The several institutional activities of the Department extend through the creation of wide collaborations with other Departments of the University and with regional, national, European and international, public and private Research and Training Institutes. Special care is spent in seeking interaction with any entrepreneurial interested in promoting excellence in scientific research, nationally and internationally, in local healthcare and in hospital environment, and in industrial production and services.

The research topics of the Department of Public Health concerning public and environmental health, clinical, diagnostic and surgery medicine, occupational medicine, nephrology and anatomy and pathologic anatomy are here detailed http://sanitapubblica.dip.unina.it/en/research/research-topics Research activities are also carried out in the framework of the PhD programme in Public Health and Preventive Medicine
http://sanitapubblica.dip.unina.it/en/teaching/phd-program/

Research output (2011-2013)

Data on the research output of the Department are extracted from the 2011-2013 Research activities Review (SUA-RD)

Staff

Data on the Department Staff is taken from the institutional website of the Italian Ministry of University and Research

Research projects

PRIN: National Research Projects

  • A Bioprocess for the optimization of 3D cardiosphere-based constructs for cardiac regenerative medicine (BEAT3DHEART) Code 20123E8FH4_002 Principal Investigator CASTALDO Clotilde   BEAT3DHEART integrates multiple biotechnological and bioengineering approaches to develop novel protocols aimed at boosting and optimizing human cardiac progenitor cells culture by favoring a physiological-like 3D expansion. This will potentially sustain their engraftment into the unfavorable myocardial environment affected by heart failure ,and their regenerative potency for tissue engineering applications, thereby possibly leading to the development and/or commercialization of therapeutic bioproducts suitable for clinical translation.

EU Projects

  • The Unit of Occupational Medicine of the Department of Public Health participates at the project H2020 "European Human Biomonitoring Initiative" acronym "HBM4EU". The European Environment Agency and the European Commission, co-funded this progetto under Horizon 2020 with Call H2020-SC1-2016-RTD (Type of Action: COFUND-EJP). The main aim of the initiative is to coordinate and advance human biomonitoring in Europe. HBM4EU will run for five years, from 2017 to 2021. Professor Ivo Iavicoli is responsible and contact person of the research unit and prof. Maurizio Manno is member of the research group.

Libraries, labs and facilities

The Department of Public Health has a number of Laboratories run by the different research groups representative of the whole institutional research activity.  On the overall, more than 20 rooms are reserved for lab activities. Each lab has its own staff and a lab manager. Besides full time employee, also medical and PhD students carry out their research programmes.

  • Laboratory of  Cytology and Molecular Predective Pathology - Il Laboratorio covers 150m2 in four difference areas: Area 1: Microdissection of neoplastic component by laser microdissection. Area 2: pre –PCR dedicated to acid nucleic purification and to PCR setup. Area 3: Area dedicated to post amplification handling; Area 4: Sequencing by ABI 3500 (Lifetechnologies) and n. 2 Ion Torrent PGM.
  • Laboratory of  Environmental Chemistry. In this lab the research activity is related to the study of the levels of contamination of the environmental compartments by persistent chemicals and their effects on health.
  • Laboratory of  Enviromental Microbiology and  Molecular Biology.  Polymerase Chain Reaction based techniques and  Pulsed-Field Gel Electrophoresis approaches are applied to investigate mechanisms of multidrug-resistance  in nosocomial pathogens. such as Stenotrophomonas, Serratia and Acinetobacter,
  • Laboratory of  Human Anatomy - Histology lab, equipped with microtome and cryostat; microscopy lab, with fluorescent microscope, time-lapse observation system, optical microscope; cell culture lab with a sterile hood and cell culture incubator.The Laboratories include molecular biology lab, equipped with research tools for ELISA, immunoblotting, and Real Time PCR.
  • Laboratory of Occupational Toxicology - Equipped with instrumentation for measuring the main occupational and environmental pollutants such as volatile organic compounds (GC-MS) and metals (ICP-MS). The laboratoru is currently being renewed.

Main Research Facilities

  • MONITOR BRUEL & KJAER Assessment of airborne pollutants Person in charge: Paolo Montuori
  • ATOMIC ABSORPTION SPECTROSCOPY. Qualitative and quantitative assessment of metal ions Person in charge: Paolo Montuori.
  • GAS CHROMATOGRAPHY-MASS SPECTROMETRY, Shimadzu SP 2100 Qualitative and quantitative assessment of different substances within a test sample Person in charge: Paolo Montuori.
  • APPLIED BIOSYSTEM GENETIC ANLYZER 3500 Eight capillary electrophoresis technology, Person in charge: Giancarlo Troncone.
  • ION CHEF ED ION PERSONAL GENOMIC MACHINE, Thermo-Fisher Preparation and sequencing analysis of genomic libraries by semiconductor technologies. Person in charge: Giancarlo Troncone.
  • LASER MICRODISSECTOR CARL ZEISS PALM MICROSYSTEM PEAM Cell and tissues selective sampling system by UV laser and a catapult system. Person in charge: Giancarlo Troncone.
  • DIGITAL COLOR-CODED BARCODE TECHNOLOGY NCOUNTER ANALYSIS SYSTEM (NANOSTRING). To enable  gene expression profiling  e gene fusion detection.
  • ICP-MS (Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometer), modello NexION 350D, ditta  Perkin Elmer. CP-MS (Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometer), Model Nexion 350D, Perkin Elmer. Determination of metals in environmental and biological matrices and characterization of nanomaterials. Responsible: Prof. Maurizio Manno.

Third Mission

Public engagement

The Department of Public Health features an intense third parties working activity for a total of 2.522.535,95 euro in 2016. This income supports professionals, who work on the behalf of the university, and covers consumable and instrumentation costs. Most of this third parties working activity includes enviromental, microbiological and health survellance of several pubblic and private institutions, also involving a number of health care centers.

  • The Department of Public Health is the most large-volume referral Laboratories of the https://www.ras-aktive.it  program;  this network was specifically devised to outsource from community hospitals to our Department biologic material in order to perform KRAS and NRAS exon 2, 3 and 4 mutation analysis to select patient potentially responsive to anti EGFR treatment of advanced colorectal cancer. DNA is extracted from neoplastic cells selectively sampled by laser microdissection and processed by a number of techyniques including next generation sequencing
  • The Department of Public Health is the most large-volume referral Laboratories of the https://www.azfastnet.it/ program;  this network was specifically devised to outsource from community hospitals to our Department biologic material in order to perform EGFR exon 19 and 21  mutation analysis to select lung cancer patients potentially responsive to tyrosine kinase inhibitors . DNA is extracted from histological and cytological slides taking care to selectively sample neoplastic cells by laser microdissection.
  • BRIC 2017: "DEVELOPMENT AND VALIDATION ON REAL CASE STUDIES FOR OPERATIONAL PROCEDURES FOR THE RISK OF CHEMICAL RISK FOR INHALATION AND DERMIC CONTACT OF OPERATORS INVOLVED IN THE BONIFICATION OF HIGH ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINATION SITES AND FOR HIS MAPPATURE ON TERRITORIAL SCALE". CUP CODE: E82F17000860005. Responsible: Maurizio Manno, Coll. with INAIL, University of Rome Tor Vergata (coordinator), University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, ULSS 3 Serenissima (Venice), ASL Sassari, ATS Metropolitan City of Milan. The project is aimed at defining and developing harmonized operational procedures for the assessment and management of workers' risks in the field of remediation activities related to contaminants in soil and groundwater in environmental matrices.