Elisa Cimetta is Associate Professor at the Department of Industrial Engineering.

She graduated in Chemical Engineering and obtained her PhD in Industrial Engineering at the University of Padua. Between 2010 and 2013 she was an Associate Research Scientist at the Biomedical Engineering Department at Columbia University, New York, USA, and was awarded a prestigious fellowships by the New York Stem Cell Foundation. In 2011, she also completed the Postbaccalaureate Business Program at Columbia University. She is a co-founder of EpiBone, a Columbia University spinoff that aims at generating custom-shaped bone and osteochondral tissues. Her main research interests are focused on the application of engineering principles to biological studies. In particular, her laboratory specializes in the design and development of advanced microscale technologies and microbioreactor platforms (μBR) for the in vitro culture of cells. The ultimate goal of the research is the optimization of biological models and cell cultures for their application in clinical settings. In 2017 she was awarded an ERC Starting Grant for the project MICRONEX (2017-2022), which aims at understanding the role of exosomes-mediated dissemination in Neuroblastoma through the design and use of μBRs. In 2017 she also joined the Fondazione Istituto di Ricerca Pediatrica (IRP) in Padova, an opportunity that enabled to greatly strengthen the biological aspects and significance of her laboratory’s research.