Board of Directors
The Association is administered by a Board of Directors of three to twenty-
The Board of Directors is elected by the Assembly, holds office for three year and each member can be re-elected. At least two thirds of the members of the Board must be elected to represent the Founding Members.
Current members of the Board of Directors are:
PRESIDENT – Sanzio Bassini
Sanzio Bassini, Director of the Application and Innovation Department of Supercomputing of CINECA, the Italian Interuniversity Consortium, Scientific Director of International Foundation Big Data and AI of Human Development.
He has been an independent reviewer of many international digital infrastructure projects, recently member of the expert committee of the Canadian Major Science Initiative Fund 2017 – 2022. Over the years he has been Vice President of the Research Area of the European Technology Platform for HPC – ETP4HPC AISBL 2012 – 2014 and President of the Partnership for Advanced Computing – PRACE Council in the period 2014 – 2106.
After being the Italian Sherpa representative in the working group for the establishment of the JU EuroHPC, he is currently a Member of the EuroHPC Infrastructure Advisory Board and Leader of the EuroHPC Italian Pre- Exascale Leonardo Infrastructure Project.
VICEPRESIDENT – Marina Silverii
Executive Director of ART-ER, expert in coordinating activities and services for technology transfer, research results valorization, skills and talent attraction. Vice President of the Fondazione Ecosister.
For 10 years, she was in charge of the European Resource Center for Orientation, promoted by the Ministry of Labor and the European Commission. She is a member of the Technical Scientific Committee of APRE. On appointment by the MUR, she is an expert member of the Italian Task Force of the EIC and EIE Program Committee within Horizon Europe 2021-2027. She is a member of the Management Board of the European Association Nereus.
Eugenio Scapparone
Eugenio Scapparone is Director of Research at INFN (National Institute of Nuclear Physics) – Bologna. Since January 1, 2020, he is Director of INFN – Bologna (120 employees and 300 associated). During his scientific career, he has been active in the experimental field of fundamental physics, nuclear and subnuclear physics, and detector R&D. Scapparone is co-author of more than 650 scientific papers in international journals.
Raffaele Lodi
Raffaele Lodi is full professor of Neuroradiology at the University of Bologna. He is the Scientific Director of IRCCS “Istituto delle Scienze Neurologiche” in Bologna where his scientific activity, together with the clinical one of Diagnostic Neuroradiology, is aimed at the study of pathophysiological mechanisms and the identification of biomarkers of central nervous system diseases using advanced imaging techniques, and in particular, Magnetic Resonance Imaging.
Giovanni Ponti
Giovanni Ponti, Director of ENEA’s ICT Division and Member of the GARR Board of Directors. He earned a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from the University of Calabria in 2010 and has been a Senior Researcher at ENEA for the past 16 years. His research activities focus on HPC, Data Science, Cloud Computing, Big Data, Data Analytics, and Artificial Intelligence. Author of more than 100 scientific publications, he serves on program committees and acts as a reviewer for leading international journals and conferences.
Claudio Gheller
Claudio Gheller, Program Manager and Researcher at the INAF Institute of Radio Astronomy with over 25 years of experience in High-Performance Computing, Artificial Intelligence and Computational Astrophysics. He currently leads INAF’s activities in the National Centre for HPC, Big Data and Quantum Computing and national initiatives in advanced computing and data-intensive science. Author of more than 150 refereed scientific publications.
Stefano Cacciaguerra
Stefano Cacciaguerra is a Senior Technologist and ICT Manager at INGV, bringing a strong academic background with degrees in Computer Science, Information Science, and Management of Research, Innovation, and Technology. He specializes in designing and implementing ICT infrastructures for research, including Cloud Systems, HPC Clusters, and Data Repositories. His expertise extends to representing INGV in key organizations like ICDI and the EOSC Association, highlighting his commitment to national and European research infrastructure development. He is actively involved in several national and international projects such as DT-GEO, ChEESE-2P, Skills4EOSC, and SUPER. He also played a crucial role in the design and development of NEREIDE for EMSO and coordinated the relocation of the INGV Data Center to the DAMA Technopole in Bologna.
Marina Mordenti
Marina Mordenti has graduated in Veterinary Biotechnology and in Molecular and Cellular Biology and got a PhD in Histopathological Veterinary Disciplines. She is a senior researcher at the Rare Skeletal Disorders Department of IRCCS Istituto Ortopedico Rizzoli. Her research activities are focused on disease registries and modelling of platforms for biomedical data management.
She is involved in several projects and author of peer reviewed publications.
Giovanni Farneti
Giovanni Farneti, graduated in Electronic Engineering, University of Bologna, with a master’s degree in “Management of Technological Innovation for Public Administrations”. Currently Head of Big Data & IoT Unit at Lepida ScpA. Project manager for regional and European projects, IT Expert, senior Data Analyst. Graduated in Clinical Psychology, University of Padua. Clinical psychologist (Reg.N.11039), specializing in psychoanalytic psychotherapy.
Gianmarco Braghi
Gianmarco Braghi is an alumnus of Trinity College Dublin and Senior Assistant Professor of History of Christianity and Churches at the University of Palermo. Since 2017, he has been a member of FSCIRE, where he was Coordinator of the “Giuseppe Alberigo” European School for Advanced Religious Studies from 2018 to 2025. He is a member of the faculty board of the national doctorate in Religious Studies (DREST), of the directors’ board of the Reformation Research Consortium (REFORC), and of the scientific advisory board of the international project “Epistolae John Calvin”. From 2023 to 2026, he was Deputy Principal Investigator of the NRRP project Italian Strengthening of the ESFRI RI RESILIENCE (ITSERR), funded by the Ministry of University and Research and dedicated to the technological development and reinforcement of the European Research Infrastructure on Religious Studies spearheaded by FSCIRE.
Nicola Gentili
Nicola Gentili is a Computer Science professional at the IRCCS IRST (Istituto Romagnolo per lo Studio dei Tumori “Dino Amadori”). Coordinator of Data Unit of the IRST works as Data Scientist, Business developer, and researcher in the Outcome Research Unit. Nicola is pursuing studies in Digital Transformation Management and actively collaborates with the Emilia-Romagna Healthcare System. He holds roles in the Steering Committee of Progetto Sanità Digitale Romagna and the Scientific Committee of Laboratorio Sanità Digitale Romagna.
Mauro Tortonesi
Mauro Tortonesi is an Associate Professor and Head of the Big Data & Compute Continuum Research Lab at the University of Ferrara. He has 15+ years of experience developing high-impact data-centric applied research projects, including Carpigiani’s Teorema platform which remotely controls 25000+ ice cream machines all over the world. He has 150+ scientific publications, 7 awards, and 4 international patents.
Simone Calderara
Simone Calderara (M age 46) is Full Professor of Machine and Deep Learning at the Engineering Department Enzo Ferrari of University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (UNIMORE) (aimagelab.unimore.it).
Director of the Artificial Intelligence Research and Innovation center (AIRI) UNIMORE, board member of the CINI National Artificial Intelligent and Intelligent System AIIS laboratory, Stanford Top 2% Scientist list. Core member of the UNIMORE ELLIS Unit.
His main research interests are deep learning techniques for online, incremental and continuous representation learning with application to human behavior understanding in industrial and urban scenarios. He has co-authored more than 90 publications with an h-index of 46 (Google Scholar).
Andrea Prati
Andrea Prati is Full Professor of Computer Engineering at University of Parma. His main research activities are related to Deep Learning, Generative Models and Computer Vision. He is head of IMPLab research lab. Since 2023 is also Vice-Rector for Information Systems, Innovation and NRRP (PNRR).
Michela Milano
Michela Milano is full professor at University of Bologna and Chair of the Interdepartmental Institute of Human-Centered AI involving more than 400 researchers and professors. Her research activity is focussed on decision support systems in particular those merging data-driven and knowledge-based models.
She is author of more than 170 papers on international conferences and journals and coordinator of many research and industrial projects.
Gabriella Scipione
Gabriella Scipione is HPC Director at CINECA, leading the strategic direction of large-scale High Performance Computing, AI, and quantum infrastructures. She served as technical lead and coordinator for numerous European HPC and AI projects across domains. She played a key role in Italy’s AI Factory and Leonardo EuroHPC proposals. Since 2024, she has been a member of the EuroHPC Infrastructure Advisory Board, contributing to the strategic development of Europe’s HPC and AI ecosystem.
Paolo Tubertini
Paolo Tubertini graduated in 2010 in Industrial and Management Engineering at the University of Bologna and got a PhD in Automatic Control and Operational Research at the University of Bologna on Operational research applied to healthcare. He is an Engineering Manager at IRCCS Azienda Ospedaliero-Universitaria di Bologna Policlinico di Sant’Orsola since 2022 in charge of redesigning the Enterprise Information Systems for Integrated Care and Research Data Management.
The Assembly
Made up of all the Members in good standing with the payment of the annual membership fee.
The ordinary shareholders’ meeting:
- elects the Board of Directors;
- elects, among the members of the Board of Directors, the President and the Vice President;
- deliberates on the admission and exclusion of Members on the proposal of the Board of Directors;
- deliberates, on proposal of the Board of Directors, the program of the activities of the Association;
- deliberates on the regulations of the Association;
- approves the annual report and the budget and balance sheet;
- ratifies the measures within its competence, adopted by the Board of Directors for reasons of urgency;
- deliberates on the possible establishment of a technical-scientific Committee with the task of providing guidance, in support of the Board of Directors;
- appoints the Auditor;
- on the proposal of the Board of Directors, decides on the amount of the one-off membership fee and on the amount of the annual membership fee that Members are required to pay for the activities and operation of the Association and on any changes to them;
- deliberates on any other matter that this Statute or the law reserves to its competence, as well as on those that the Board of Directors deems appropriate to submit to it.