Know4Nano

Presenters

Dr. Alessandro Capo

Research Technician
Institute of Food Sciences, National Research Council (ISA-CNR), Italy

Dr. Alessandro Capo was born in Salerno in 1984. He received his B.S. in Biotechnology for Health and M.S. in Medical Biotechnology from University of Naples Federico II in 2008 and 2012, respectively. He received a Ph.D. in system biology from University of Salerno in 2016. At the moment he is a Technician in the group of Dr. Sabato D’Auria at the Institute of Food Science, National Research Council. His research topics are biosensors for food safety and security, environmental pollutants detection and in the field of health. His studies are focused on the design and development of optical and impedenziometric biosensors (mainly focused on fluorescence biosensors), the molecular recognition element (MRE) identification and characterization (in-vitro and in-silico), the characterization of the molecular interactions (in-vitro and in-silico), the immunological assay development, the expression and purification of the bacteria proteins and the fluorescence spectroscopy. In particular, he identifies (also by a molecular docking in-silico approach) promising molecules to implied as MRE evaluating its structural features and behaviour changes with or without ligand and characterizing the interaction behaviours. He is involved in the immunological assay optimization for the immuno-biosensor platform development. He is involved in the surface plasmon resonance (SPR)-based and impedenziometric biosensors and development. His main activity is the development of (label-free or labelled) fluorescence biosensor development, using or the internal fluorescence of the MRE or labelling the MRE by UV and NIR fluorescence probe. He has been involved in several European and national projects, and in one international project. He has 25 publications in peer-reviewed journals (291 citations, H-index: 10).
Homepage: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5566-2867

Talk Title: Biosensors application in the real operational environment from farm-to-fork

Agricultural and food industries are the backbone of our modern society. Since the 21^st century, pesticides, fertilizers, antibiotics and drugs brought by modern industrial development have had incredible benefits to agricultural and food productivity. At the same time, the detrimental impact of their residues in food determines the loss of quality on the entire process from farm to fork. Our food systems are not sustainable, because account for nearly one-third of global Greenhouse gas (GHG), consume large amounts of natural resources, and result in biodiversity loss and negative health impacts, due to both under- and over-nutrition. The European Green Deal, through the Farm to Fork Strategy, aims to make food systems fair, healthy and environmentally friendly. New technologies and scientific discoveries, aim to accelerate our transition to a sustainable food system that should have a neutral or positive environmental impact and ensure food security, nutrition and public health. In this scenario, biosensors have long been regarded as one of the most powerful tools for providing solutions in sustainable agriculture by providing continuous monitoring or early detection of disease outbreaks that can be averted, and they also play an important role in monitoring food risk factors such as pesticides, veterinary medications, heavy metals, pathogens, poisons, and illegal additions. The biosensor is a kind of integrated tool used for sensing that combines a biological sensing element and a physicochemical transducer. Mainly, it includes the steps of sample pre-treatment, analyte extraction, detection signal conversion, and signal analysis, and ultimately detecting the analyte by transforming molecular interactions into an identifiable signal. Numerous biosensors for agricultural and food safety have emerged in the latest decade, whose advantages mainly rely on rapid test, portable accessibility, and practicality. In this perspective, will present some biosensor applications in the real operational environment for the case of antibiotics contamination of the milk, swine viruses, toxins and pesticide contamination in fruit or vegetables.

This project is funded by the European Union under Horizon Europe GA 101159710