Luca Gerosa

Personal:

I was born in Rovereto, a small town in Trentino region, Italy. I followed my studies in Computer Science at the University of Trento (Italy) and University of Edinburgh (Scotland) with a specialization in Bioinformatics. I started my doctoral studies in the lab of Prof. Uwe Sauer in January 2008.

Research interests:

I am curious about the life changing discoveries we can foresee by using Computer Science concepts to solve biological questions. My main interests in the last years have been the definition and application of mathematical and formal methods (such as boolean networks, ODEs, process algebras, Petri Nets, modal logic, temporal modal logic) for representing and analysing biological systems.

My PhD project is focused on a Systems Biology modelling approach to unravel the dynamic regulations of the central carbon metabolism in various organisms, in particular in the model organism Escherichia Coli.

Curriculum Vitae:

MSc, Computer Science - Bioinformatics, University of Edinburgh, Scotland UK 2008 (European Master in Informatics)
Laurea Specialistica, Computer Science - Bioinformatics, University of Trento, Italy 2007 (European Master in Informatics)
BSc, Computer Science, University of Trento, Italy, 2005

Activities:

- Visiting student in Iftach Nachman Lab at Tel Aviv University, Israel working on probabilistic inference of regulatory networks using the BRNI framework (from 16.04.2010 to 16.05.2010)
- iGEM 2008, partecipation as team member of the ETH Zurich team .
- iGEM 2007, partecipation as team member of the University of Edinburgh team.
- IMMEX (2003-2005), collaborator to a joint E-Learning project between UCLA and University of Trento.

Teaching and supervision:

- supervisor project "Transcriptional regulation of amino acids biosynthesis", "Metabolic Networks" Block Course, Winter Semester 2008 and Winter Semester 2009 ETH.
- supervisor semester project "Metabolite pools as state variables", 3 months semester project, student Simon Brunner, Winter Semester 2009 ETH.
- supervisor master thesis "Functional control of flux distribution by metabolite pools", 6 months master thesis project, student Sebastian Schmidt, Jan-Jul 2010 ETH.
- supervisor semester project "Inference from synthetic fluorescent promoter reporters", 3 months semester project, student Oliver Dressler, Winter Semester 2010 ETH.
- supervisor master project "Unravelling the active regulatory network of central metabolism in E. coli", 6 months master thesis project, student Simon Brunner, 2011 ETH.
- supervisor semester project "Stochastic gene expression driven by intrinsice noise in E. coli", 3 months semester project, student Roland Brunner, 2012-2013 ETH.

Presentations, Conferences, Courses and Posters

- Talk: "Dissecting transcriptional circuits from expression machinery activity", Luca Gerosa, 9th Workshop Molecular Interactions, Berlin, (GER) - Invited Speaker
- Talk: "Transcriptional flux sensors regulate E.coli central metabolism", Luca Gerosa, 12th International Conference on Systems Biology, 2 September 2011, Heidelberg (GER) - Selected Speaker
- Talk: "Inferring hidden transcription factor activities using GFP-promoter derived transcription rates", Luca Gerosa, CC-SPMD PhD program Retreat 2010.
- PhD Course: "Metabolic Engineering and Systems Biology", 7-12 Sep. 2008, Chalmers University, Goteborg (SWE) (5 ECTS)
- PhD Course: "Medical Science", 29 June - 7 July 2009, ETH Zurich and University Hospital Zurich (3 ECTS)
- PhD Course: "Systems Biology", 26 October - 9 November 2009, ETH Zurich and University Zurich (3 ECTS)
- PhD Symposium: "From sparse entities.. to crowded environments: numbers in living systems", 7-9 December 2009, Frontiers in Life Science graduate school, Paris
- Poster: "
- Poster: "Constructing minimal cells by genome reduction and selection: A synthetic biology approach", Sven Dietz, Luca Gerosa, ETHZ 2008 iGEM Team, Jörg Stelling, Sven Panke - ECSB II: Design, Programming and Optimisation of Biological Systems, 29 March -3 April 2009, Sant Feliu de Guixols (SPA).
- Poster: ".. Lost in Transcription! Inferring transcription factors activity profiles from GFP-based measuraments", at PhD Symposium 7-9 December 2009, Frontiers in Life Science graduate school, Paris (FRA)
- Poster: "Inferring transcription factor activities from transcription rate of their target genes", Luca Gerosa, Karl Kochanowski, Bart Haverkorn von Rijsewick, Iftach Nachman, Matthias Heinemann, Uwe Sauer, at Frontiers 2010 conference, Exeter University, 21-24 September 2010. (GBR)

Scolarships:

- reciepient of Erasmus Mundus scolarship for the European Master in Informatics (EuMI) program (2007-2008).

Publications:

Systems Biology and Bioinformatics:

- Gerosa L, Kochanowski K, Heinemann M, Sauer U.
Dissecting specific and global transcriptional regulation of bacterial gene expression. Mol Syst Biol. 2013 Apr 16;9:658. doi: 10.1038/msb.2013.14. (Featured Article)

- Kochanowski K, Volkmer B, Gerosa L, R Haverkorn van Rijsewijk B, Schmidt A, Heinemann M (2013) Functioning of a metabolic flux sensor in Escherichia coli. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A.

- Gerosa L. and Sauer U. Regulation and control of metabolic fluxes in microbes, Curr Opin Biotechnol (2011), doi:10.1016/j.copbio.2011.04.016 (pubmed link)

- Gerosa L., "Stochastic Process algebras for modelling Synthetic Biology systems", Master Thesis. (download here )

Computer Science (E-Learning):

- Gerosa L., Giordani A., Ronchetti M., Soller A. and Stevens R.(2004).
”Symmetric Synchronous Collaborative Navigation.”
In IADIS International Conference WWW/Internet 2004. Edited byIsaiasP.,
KarmakarN., IADISPress, Lisboa, Portugal:2004.Vol.1, p.748-754

- Giordani A., Gerosa L., Soller A. and Stevens R.(2005).
”Extending an Online Individual Scientific Problem-solving Environment
to Support and Mediate Collaborative Learning.”
12th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education.,
Amsterdam, TheNetherlands

- Ronchetti M., Gerosa L., Giordani A., Soller A. and StevensR.(2005)
”Symmetric Synchronous Collaborative Navigation Applied to E-Learning.”
in the IADIS International Journal of WWW/Internet(ISSN:1645-7641)

- Stevens R., Soller A., Gerosa L., Giordani A., Cooper M.and Cox C.(2005)
”Developing a Framework for Integrating Prior Problem Solving and Knowledge
Sharing Histories of a Group to Predict Future Group Performance”
CollaborateCom 2005 Conference, SanJose, CA, USA