Associate Professor

Maria Concetta Miniaci graduated with honors in Medicine and Surgery from the University of Catanzaro. After a year as a research fellow at the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, he continued his education at the Department of Neuroscience at the University of Turin, where he furthered the study of synaptic plasticity in the cerebellum under the guidance of Filippo Tempia and Piergiorgio Strata.
In 2002, she joined Nobel Prize winner Eric R. Kandel's research group at Columbia University in New York, helping to discover a new cellular mechanism critical to memory persistence. During that period, he received recognition from the Italian Academy of Advanced Studies in America for his scientific contribution. In 2018, she was appointed Schaefer Research Scholar and Visiting Professor at Columbia University.
He is currently Associate Professor of Physiology at the Department of Pharmacy of the University of Naples Federico II. His research activity is focused on the study of the cerebellar circuit in physiological and pathological conditions. In collaboration with David Sulzer (Columbia University) he recently demonstrated that aversive learning induces an increase in norepinephrine release from locus coeruleus projections to the cerebellum. This work represents the first evidence that the release of norepinephrine is a plastic process, modulated by learning.
He is an active member of the editorial board of international scientific journals, a reviewer for funding agencies, and a member of international scientific societies. His research is supported by national and international funding.