Phd in CHEMICAL SCIENCES

email: francesca.buiarelli@uniroma1.it
phone: 0649913645
building: Cannizzaro CU014
room: 230

Francesca Buiarelli has been Associate professor of Analytical Chemistry (CHIM 01) at “Sapienza” University of Rome (Chemistry Department) since 2020.

She took her Master’s degree, cum Laude, in Chemistry, her PhD degree in Chemical Sciences, and her specialization degree in Food Science cum laude, at Rome University “La Sapienza”.
She was researcher from 1999 to 2020 in the same department. In September 2019 she received the national qualification as Associate Professor and in November 2020 as Full Professor (CHIM 01).

Previously, before her PhD she worked as a researcher in the field of Chemical Physics at the Metallurgy development center (CSM), then, after her PhD up to 1999, she worked as chemical director at the Defense Minister and as Chemist at the Antidoping laboratory of Sport Federation of the National Olympic Committee.

She has been teaching Analytical Chemistry (separation sciences) since 2001 in different courses for the Bachelor of Chemistry, Master degree of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, master’s degree of Analytical Chemistry and Biotechnology and second level master courses of Forensic Analytical Chemistry and Scientific investigation techniques in the food sector at Sapienza University.
Furthermore, since 2024 he has been teaching at the second level master’s degree Mass spectrometry in clinical field at the Catholic University.
She was member of the Doctoral Committee of the PhD Program in: "Analytical Chemistry of real systems" from 2000 to 2010.
Since 2024, she has been member of the Doctoral Committee of the PhD Program in: "Chemical Science”
She was member (2005-2008) of the Advisory Commission on veterinary drugs appointed by the Minister of Health- Directorate General for Veterinary Health and Food-
From 2012 to 2015 she was appointed expert for the evaluation of programs and projects on behalf of the Ministry of Education, University and Research and for the evaluation of research products on behalf of ANVUR.
Since 2019 she has been in the REPRISE register of scientific experts established by the MIUR for the BASIC RESEARCH section
Since 1999 she has been member in several commission for the award of doctoral, researcher and professor positions

RESEARCH SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY
Her scientific research activity is mainly aimed at the optimization, implementation, and development of innovative, rapid, smart and economical analytical methodologies for solving problems in various fields. For this purpose, three different fields are involved: Food, clinical/pharmacological Chemistry and Environmental Chemistry.

1) Study of the composition, quality and safety of food
Food safety and consumer health are priorities in our society; therefore, the production and consumption of food have important economic, social and, in many cases, environmental repercussions. To this aim, the research activity focuses on the one hand on the characterization of natural organic compounds present in complex food matrices, and on the other hand on the determination of residues and contaminants present in food harmful to human health. The characterization of the food allows on the one hand to verify its genuineness, on the other hand to highlight any fraud, contamination and alteration of the same. The food matrices taken into consideration are both of vegetable origin (oils, wines, beverages, citrus essential oils, honey, cereals, fruit etc.) and animal (milk, eggs, meat, etc.).
In this context he received funding from the Ministry of Health after a competition, as Operative Unit leader
2) Study of metabolism and excretion of illegal drugs in human and animal fluids
With the goal of producing reliable data and analytical reports that present all the characteristics necessary for legal, forensic and veterinary/sport use, this line of research consists in the development and validation, according to the criteria of the European legislation, of new analytical methodologies for the research and dosage of endogenous/exogenous substances (xenobiotics, drug residues, and growth promoters) in complex matrices such as biological fluids of animal and human origin.
Particular attention is devoted to the implementation of extraction/purification methodologies and to the optimal use of multihyphenated analytical techniques such as gaschromatography/masspectrometry with EI and CI source, classical HPLC and UHPLC with UV and tandem mass spectrometry detection and to CE with diode array detection.

3) Environmental analytical Chemistry
The number of organic species, present in environmental matrices, recognized as harmful is constantly increasing, generating a growing concern of the scientific community, both for the impact that these substances have on the environment, and for the hygienic-sanitary effects on population and on some categories of workers. The lack of studies about the presence, the sources, the diffusion in the environment and of the toxicity of emerging contaminants, also introduced in function of technological changes, requires constantly new strategies to fill these gaps.
In this context, the studies are focused on the monitoring, in indoor and outdoor environment, of old and emerging organic pollutants such as PAHs, nitro PAHs, oxy-PHAs, mycotoxins, flame retards FR, PCB, pesticides, plasticizer etc. in particulate matter (PM) and on the study and characterization of the bioaerosol (determination of fungi, bacteria, algae) by chemical biomarkers in collaboration with INAIL research, certification and verification sector.
The proposed methodologies were also applied to other environmental matrixes such as soils and water
In these different sectors she has several multidisciplinary collaborations with other University (Florence, Pisa, Perugia) and researchr groups of different Institution (ISS, CNR, INAIL IZS).

In this sector, she has received substantial funding, after competition, as Principal Investigator (PI) (BRIC INAIL2016-ID23- project, 540000 €) and as research unit leader (BRIC INAIL2019-ID13-project, 245000 €).

She is component of the Editorial board of the three indexed journals:
Current Analytical Chemistry (CAC)
International Journal environmental research and public health (IJERPH) (up to 2023)
Foods


Bibliometric data
Source: Scopus
H-index:23
Publications:78
Citations:1493