Born in Monza, she grew up in Milan, in Via Leopardi. She is married to Paolo, a doctor, and has two children. As of 2019, Beatrice, the elder, studies languages at the University of Milan and Giorgio, younger by five years, attends the scientific high school.[1][2]
Graduated with honours in Medicine and Surgery (1986) with a speciality in Nuclear Medicine (1989) from the University of Milan.[3]
She carried out several periods of study in the United States and England.[4]
After a research experience at San Raffaele in Milan, she became associate professor at the University of Milano-Bicocca in 2001 and full professor in 2013. She was director of the complex operating unit of nuclear medicine at the San Gerardo Hospital [it] in Monza (from 2005 to 2012), of the Molecular Bioimaging Centre (now part of the Technomed Foundation) at the University of Milano-Bicocca, and director of the Department of Health Sciences at the same university (2012–2013).[5]
From 2013 to 2019 she was rector of the Bicocca University, the first woman to hold this position at a Milanese university and the fourth in Italy. As a member of the Council of the Conference of Italian University Rectors (CRUI), she was in charge of Research. As rector, she was president of the first Italian inter-university foundation, U41 (since 2017) and a member of the Coordination Committee of Human Technopole. Among her various institutional positions, she was Vice-President of CNR from 2011 to 2015.
She also had several roles at European level. Since 2013, she was the Italian MIUR delegate in the Horizon 2020 programme.
[6] She appears in the Top 2% Scientists list of Stanford University for number of publications and citations, together with about four thousand researchers based in Italy out of the total 159,684 listed.[7]