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UNIPD

Dating back to 1222, the University of Padova (UNIPD) is one of the leading Universities in Italy and has a long tradition of scientific excellence. It is among the earliest universities of the world and the second oldest in Italy. UNIPD offers its students 37 doctoral degree courses and 44 research and service centres across the spectrum of sciences, medicine, social sciences and humanities. The Department of Neuroscience was created in January 2012 from the confluence of the Department of Neuroscience and the Department of Medical-surgical specialties. It has operationally begun to reach the objectives on whose foundations had been formed and has the mission to facilitate diagnosis, treatment, reconstruction and rehabilitation of diseases of the nervous system and the cephalic end, falling in neurology, neurosurgery, ophthalmology, psychobiological, reconstructive, maxillofacial, audiology and rehabilitation. This articulation, based also on the contiguity of scientific-disciplinary areas, guarantees the recognition of groups and skills and allows comparability with homologous structures recognized internationally. The increasing integration between the components of the Department is also reflected in the welfare area with the objective to maximize the goal to continuously improve the level of science education and excellence in health care. The Department of Neuroscience coordinates the PD_Pal activities and has been certified by the international audit from the Italian Ministry of Education among the 100 Italian University Departments of Excellence and first in the field of Neuroscience.

People

Angelo Antonini

MD, PhD, Professor of Neurology

Prof Angelo Antonini, is Professor of Neurology at the University of Padua and director of the Parkinson Unit Neurology Clinic in Padua University Hospital with an affiliation to the Institute of Neurorehabilitation San Camillo in Venice. He earned his medical degree from the Università degli Studi di Roma ‘La Sapienza’, Rome. In November 1990 he completed his neurology training with honors and then undertook a visiting fellowship at the PET Department Paul Scherrer Institute, Villigen, Switzerland before starting in 1991 his PhD in neuroradiology under the supervision of Professor Klaus Leenders. In 1995 he started as Assistant Professor of Neurology at the North Shore Hospital/New York University hospital where he continued his research on definition of imaging biomarkers of the dopamine system and associated neurodegenerations the processes. He also focused his research on characterization of brain networks in PD using FDG-PET. He received the first award from the National Parkinson Foundation for ‘young researchers in Parkinson’s disease’. In 1996 he was awarded the Junior Faculty Award and in 1996/97 from United Parkinson Foundation and Parkinson's Disease Foundation for his research in the field of Parkinson’s disease. From November 1997 to end 2009 he worked at the Parkinson Institute in Milan where he coordinated Clinical Research at the Department of Neuroscience and had his accademic affiliation at the 2nd University of Milan (Bicocca). In 2010 he became director of the Parkinson and movement disorders unit at the research institute for neurorehabilitation San Camillo in Venice and is responsible of the Movement Disorders section at 1st Neurology Clinic in Padua. His research focuses on pharmacology of dopaminergic medications, neuroimaging as well as cognitive and behavioural aspects of Parkinson’s disease. In addition, he is actively involved in the use of continuous infusion of levodopa and apomorphine infusion as well as subthalamic nucleus deep brain stimulus (STNDBS) for the treatment of motor fluctuations and dyskinesia of complicated Parkinson patients. During his academic career he has published 305 indexed peer-reviewed manuscripts and several book chapters. His H-Index is 65 and has 14105 citations (Scopus). He is member of President Elect of the Movement Disorders Society – European Section, Member of the Task Force for Palliative Care of the Movement Disorders Society, Member of the Assembly of Delegates and Chair of the Movement Disorders Research Group of the European Academy of Neurology.

Giovanni Gentile

Psychologist, Research Fellow

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