Personale docente

Simonetta Croci is Professor of Applied Physics (sector Fis/07) since 2014 at the Department of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma. She graduated in Physics from the University of Parma in 1998 and obtained a postgraduate diploma in Health Physics from the University of Bologna in 2000. She obtained her PhD at Institut für Kernphysik und Nukleare Festkörperphysik of Technische Universität München (Germany).
Teaching activities are carried out at the Department of Medicine and Surgery and cover both Bachelor's and Combined Bachelor's degree courses in Medicine and Surgery, as well as specialisation schools, in particular in the field of health physics and radiation protection. In 2019, he participated in the Erasmus+ training mobility Programme at the Superior School of Health - University of Algarve- Purtugal, lecturing in health physics.
er research interests have always been in the field of biophysics and physics applied to biological systems with a focus on applications in the medical field and radiobiology. Since 2022 he has been involved in the INFN project FRIDA (FLASH Radiotherapy with hIgh Dose-rate particle beAms). In this project SC studies the integrity and rearrangement of microtubules using conventional and super-resolution microscopy as a target for ionising radiation damage. Within the same project, he is conducting an experiment to show changes in the collagen network by irradiating 3D collagen pads in both FLASH and conventional modes and studying them with two-photon microscopy.

She is the project leader of a project called BIOTARGET (supported by the Enrico Fermi Historical Museum of Physics and Study and Research Centre), which aims to study innovative parameters to correlate membrane and/or cytoskeleton damage with the biological effect of various ionising radiations (X-rays and protons). After irradiation, cells are observed analysed using various techniques including atomic force microscopy (AFM). Recently, the use of STORM microscopy (STochastic Optical Reconstruction Microscopy) in collaboration with the Paris-based start-up Abbelight has enabled the identification of structural rearrangements of cytoskeleton microtubules irradiated with X-rays or protons. This line of research opened a collaboration with the Clinical Radiology Group (Biophysics Department) of the GSI in Darmstad, Germany. This study is part of a larger project on the effect of different ionising radiations on new cellular targets, with the aim of answering open questions such as the induction of secondary tumours following radiotherapy or a phenomenon known as radiation-induced bystander effect (RIBE), which occurs in non-irradiated cells adjacent to irradiated cells.
More in the field of biophysics, but in connection with the previous project, a K+ biosensor was investigated using sequences of oligonucleotides wrapped in G-Quadruplex structures. In this project, we want to develop a method for measuring the potassium concentration in the extracellular medium using only UV-VIS and CD spectroscopy on the G-quadruplex structure. The use of this biosensor, without probes, on the extracellular media of X-ray-irradiated tumour and non-tumour cells aims to test whether damage to the cell membrane leads to an escape of K+. The K+ biosensor study followed a 2005 project showing the anti-tumour properties of potassium ascorbate and D-ribose solution with potassium bicarbonate.
Previously, research was focused on the oxidation of haemoglobin using Mössbauer spectroscopy and UV-VIS techniques, and was aimed at developing a diagnostic tool for use in patients with degenerative diseases. The research activity was aimed at protein dynamics with a focus on the conformational changes of haemoglobin to investigate a possible influence of the quaternary structure. The structure-dynamics-function relationship in proteins was also the subject of research with elastic and quasi-elastic incoherent neutron scattering experiments on trypsin, lysozyme and beta-lactoglobulin. His research activity has also covered the field of health physics and radiation protection, in particular studies on low exposure to radioactivity during marble extraction, monitoring in the vicinity of the Caorso nuclear power plant, and induced currents in personnel working in the presence of high magnetic fields (NMR).

She has been a member of the Italian Physical Society (SIF) since 1999. She was elected as a member of the President's Council of the SIF from 2008 to 2019 and as its Cash Secretary from 2013 to 2019. In 2021, she was appointed Honorary Member of the Italian Physical Society.
From 2007 to 2013 she was elected as the Italian representative of IBAME (International Board on the Application of the Mössbauer Effect). She has been a member of the INBB (National Institute for Biostructures and Biosystems) since 2008. She has been a member of EPS (European Physical Society) since 2012. She has been a member of SIBPA (Italian Society of Pure and Applied Biophysics) since 2019.
She has been a member of INFN (National Institute of Nuclear Physics) since 2022;
She has participated as a representative of SIF in all the working tables and activities that led to the drafting of the UNI Standard UNI 11683:2017 (Non-regulated professional activities - Professional physicist - Requirements of knowledge, skills and competence) and its approval by the National Federation of Orders of Chemists and Physicists. She is involved in the Editorial Committee of the journal for the dissemination of scientific culture Il Nuovo Saggiatore and the SIF Newsletter PrimaPagina. She is on the editorial board of the La Rivista del Nuovo Cimento.