Multiple sclerosis, Valerio Chiurchiù wins the 2024 Rita Levi Montalcini Award

Study of bioactive lipids and immunology are his passions

ROME – Dr. Valerio Chiurchiù, 40 years old, from Rome, today won the Rita Levi Montalcini Award established 25 years ago by Fism to enhance young researchers on multiple sclerosis.

Chirchiù was able to combine the two great scientific passions he encountered in his career: the study of bioactive lipids and immunology, and apply them in multiple sclerosis.

As the official motivation for the Award explains, starting from basic research carried out in the laboratory, it is arriving at innovative proposals that can change the paradigm of therapy in MS, especially in the advanced stages.

Biologist, with a PhD in immunology and applied biotechnology, and work experience carried out abroad at important universities, including Harvard University, he is a researcher at the Institute of Translational Pharmacology of the CNR and for five years has directed the Laboratory of Resolution of Neuroinflammation at the Irccs Santa Lucia Foundation in Rome.

He is the author of 70 peer-reviewed articles from 2005 to today, of which 30 as first author. He has many collaborations at a national and international level, one above all with Professor Charles Serhan, Harvard Medical School (Boston, USA).

He has taught for several years at the Faculty of Medicine and Surgery of the Campus Bio-Medico University of Rome and at the Icomm – International College of Ostheopathic Manual Medicine in Rome.

“Fism – declares the winner of the 2024 Rita Levi Montalcini Prize – has always believed in our scientific approach, which aims to resolve inflammation instead of blocking it. This new method, based on a class of bioactive lipids called pro-resolvins, derivatives from omega 3 and omega 6 acids present in the diet, can resolve inflammation in multiple sclerosis and improve the course of the disease, especially in the advanced stages.”

“We are now starting the first clinical trial on patients, which is in the approval phase, to test this approach. The prospects for therapeutic improvements are very high – he concludes – thanks also to the support of Fism for our studies. We have a challenge to face and a promising future ahead of us.”