3. A source of inspiration

- March 11, 2019

Ciao, Hello, Salut,

I hope you guys are doing great.

As you can understand from the title of this post I decided to share with you some thoughts about a woman that I see as an example. I am talking about Rita Levi-Montalcini, an Italian neurologist and researcher who won the Nobel Prize in 1986 for her findings in the field of neurobiology. She discovered the Nerve Growth Factor, a protein that promotes the development of the sensory and sympathetic nervous systems. Last week I finished reading her autobiography “Elogio dell’imperfezione” and it captured my attention so much that I decided to dedicate her a post. I read the book in Italian and I’m not sure about the existance of a translated version, but, if you get curious and you want to know more about her, I am sure you can find lots of references on the web.

Rita Levi Montalcini was born in a Jewish family. She managed to convince her family to let her continuing education in an age when women were seen as wives and mothers and definitely not as researchers. She graduated at the University of Turin Medical School in 1936. Unfortunately, because of the racial laws, she had to stop her career as assistant professor and to hide herself and her family. And guess what she did? In order to continue her research she set up a laboratory in her bedroom first and then in her hiding place. She survived the Holocaust and at the end of the war she resumed her career. She spent about 30 years at the Washington University of St. Louis and about one year in Rio de Janeiro. The will to come back to Italy and be closer to her family was one of the reasons that drove her to establish a second laboratory in Rome. From 1961 to 1969, she directed the Research Centre of Neurobiology of the CNR, and from 1969 to 1978, the Laboratory of Cellular Biology. Even after her retirement she continued to be involved in the research carried out in the lab as guest professor.

Personally, I was astonished by her motivation. She went ahead even when she couldn’t work and she had to escape and hide. She went ahead even when results were not encouraging. Passion, perseveration, and hard work led her to success. She was a great woman and a great researcher! 👏👏👏

Now, just few updates about my PhD. This second year is very busy. Right now I’m spending some weeks at the LPICM (Ecole Polytechnique, Paris, France) for the mechanical characterisation of the nanosensors before their integration in the road pavement. I’ll keep you posted about that.

Today I want to share with you some good news. First of all, my paper was accepted for the 8^th EATA (European Asphalt Technology Assocciation) conference that will be held in June in Granada, Spain. At this link you can find more information about the conference: https://www.eata2019.com/. Only 32 papers among more than 100 submitted manuscripts were accepted for an oral presentation and will be published in a special issue of the RMPD journal. As you can imagine I am really honoured and I want to thank my supervisors Simon Pouget (EIFFAGE) and Bérengère Lebental (IFSTTAR) for the work done.

Finally, last by not least, I won a prize!!! On 6-7 February I attended the poster session for PhD students at the Journée Techniques Routes (JTR 2019, organised by IFSTTAR, Cerema and IDRRIM) and I won the first prize for best poster. 🎉🏆 Here below some pictures. Once again, thanks to my supervisors for their support.