“I left Italy because I had the ambition to do an ‘adventurous’ research, not to be limited by what was available in a particular centre. I went to look for the equipment and the knowledge I needed to answer certain questions I honestly didn’t think I would ever go back to my Tuscany, except in the retirement phase. Then the story of the Human Technopole came out. Abroad it was said that Italy had finally invested considerable resources to launch an institute of international research, with the ambition to attract as many nationalities as possible and with an adequate budget to be able to acquire technologies, maintain them over time, and hire people with suitable skills.A scientist had left Germany to lead the new reality, Iain Mattaj. Trust me, I applied.” Thus begins the adventure of Gaia Pigino in the operating hub that is located in the area that hosted the 2015 Expo in Milan. One of her many ‘new beginnings’, for her who at the age of 18 had to leave a career as an agonist in fencing, interrupted by diabetes.
Born in 1976, with a degree in Natural Sciences from the University of Siena, where she also completed a doctorate and was a postdoc research fellow, she does not hide the ‘hardships’ of a brain that fled abroad and returned, but at the same time admits that she suffered when she decided to take the leap and leave Italy, her family, her native Siena and the Contrada della Torre where she grew up. “But I gave priority to research,” she tells Adnkronos Salute. Today you are Associate Head of the Center for Structural Biology of Human Technopole (Ht).
“The problem is not the escape, but the non-return of talent”
And to the Minister of Health Orazio Schillaci, who believes that stopping the bleeding of our best brains is the best investment we can make and a goal that we cannot fail, he would suggest “to continue to sponsor research in such a way that the positions in Italy are attractive for researchers who come from abroad, whether they are returning Italians or international researchers who come from other countries”. To do this, he observes, “there is a need for adequate economic support, but also lasting over time. A 5-year exploit is worth little for those who do research. Especially when there is a need to install technologies that require time to make them work” . The other thing is “the clarity and transparency in the processes of selection and allocation of funds, such as grants. But also the independence of young people: the more squashed the hierarchy, the more the body that carries out research today is appreciated a international level. Because those who are talented want to be independent”.
When it comes to brain drain, Pigino points out that the problem is not so much seeing them go away. “We are all a bit of a wanderer, not only Italians leave their country for experiences abroad. Internationality is a pre-requisite for high-level research. In competitions for positions or in evaluations for grants, we also look at how far people have moved, because it opens up the mind.” Italy’s problem is that, “if you leave when you are young because you want to gain experience abroad, then it is difficult to return to a position that reflects the skills you have acquired. There is little exchange and mobility, little flexibility in system. We should be able both to bring back Italian brains gone out, and to increase the internationality of our academic and research system”.
The international factor
Today at HT Pigino shares the direction of the Center for Structural Biology with Alessandro Vannini, also a mastermind who has returned from London. There are 5 research groups. “Young people from Italy, the USA, the UK, Spain, Pakistan, Holland, India and Switzerland work in my laboratory – he lists – Age: from 24 to 35 years. The bet of the institute is to ensure that we can cultivate an influx of young, strong and talented minds from all over the world. Sharing all these different cultures is our strong point. We have 3 group leaders who are in their first independent experience: Ana Casañal is Spanish, Francesca Coscia is Italian and both arrive from an experience in the UK (Mrc-Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge), and Philipp Erdmann first went to the USA, then returned to Germany (at the Max Plank Institute for Biochemistry in Martinsried) and is now here in Italy”.
Years earlier, pursuing her scientific dream, Pigino first stopped at the Polytechnic (Eth) of Zurich, after 4 years she landed at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden where she won a position as group leader and starting a laboratory bringing knowledge and technologies. Its added value? The experience on “cryo-tomography – he explains – a microscopy technique that allows you to look at protein complexes in the context of the cell at a high resolution, molecular level. In Dresden I had a budget and a group of 6 people and I was able start my line of research related to the biology of cilia, crucial organelles” which are like ‘antennae’ and are found “in eukaryotic cells”. Here is “what is offered abroad to a 30-year-old person who has decided to move and learn new things. Perhaps in Italy it is more difficult to see all this, partly because there are few resources, but also for reasons related to the process academic”.
After 9 years in Dresden, Pigino accepts the challenge of returning to Italy, where he arrives in 2021 on the basis of the agreement with HT signed in 2020. A challenge in tricolor sauce also accepted by her husband, Austrian, computational biologist. “A pinch of patriotism – she smiles – weighed on my choice: if I can bring everything I’ve learned to Italy and help make it a point of reference for this type of research, it makes me proud. And then as a national facility we also have the possibility to share technology with the Italian academic world and give willing young researchers the opportunity to also become competent on this front”.
The challenge of starting from scratch at home
An assessment of the first years after the return? “It was all very tiring, you work a lot and sleep little. I kind of expected it because starting an institute with these ambitions from scratch is not easy anywhere – he assures – In Italy perhaps there are some things that , with the help of the competent ministers, we will be able to optimize in the future to ensure that there is no bureaucratic handicap for this institute compared to other similar ones in the world.There are quite long processes, made to avoid corruption and waste of resources , but scientists are already ‘structured’ to spend the few resources they have wisely. Even abroad. Streamlining these processes would make our lives a little less complicated and allow us to focus even more on research”.
Pigino, in any case, is not discouraged in the face of difficulties as she is used to starting over from scratch. In her sporting life she was in the national youth fencing team for 5 years, a career she had to say goodbye to one step away from her first Olympic experience. Then the love of science. “Maybe that’s also why I threw myself into it – she says – science saved my life”. With the same determination, the scientist has already reaped the first fruits at HT. With his team he was able to enter the laboratory in September-October 2021 “and in August 2022 we submitted to the journal ‘Nature Structural & Molecular Biology’ an article entirely developed at the Human Technopole”, which was published in January 2023. ” For us it was exceptional because in record time, thanks to the electron microscopy facility which is already functioning perfectly, we were able to obtain data of a quality that we could not even achieve in Dresden”.
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