Elena Cattaneo (; born 22 October 1962) is an

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...

pharmacologist Pharmacology is a branch of medicine, biology and pharmaceutical sciences concerned with drug or medication action, where a drug may be defined as any artificial, natural, or endogenous (from within the body) molecule which exerts a biochemic ...

and co-founding director of the

University of Milan The University of Milan ( it, Università degli Studi di Milano; la, Universitas Studiorum Mediolanensis), known colloquially as UniMi or Statale, is a public research university in Milan, Italy. It is one of the largest universities in Europe ...

's Center for Stem Cell Research. She is an internationally prominent Huntington's disease researcher and stem cell research advocate. She is internationally recognised for her major commitment to research ethics and research policy, and for increasing knowledge and engagement in research among the general public. On 30 August 2013, she was appointed

senator for life A senator for life is a member of the senate or equivalent upper chamber of a legislature who has life tenure. , six Italian senators out of 206, two out of the 41 Burundian senators, one Congolese senator out of 109, and all members of the B ...

in the Italian Parliament.

Biography

Cattaneo was born in

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city ...

. After graduating (summa cum laude) in pharmacy in 1986, she moved to

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

for a few years, where she specialized at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of th ...

. She studied neural stem cell differentiation in the area of the human brain associated with degenerative diseases under Professor Ronald McKay. Another of her mentors was Professor

Anders Björklund Anders Björklund' (born 11 July 1945) is a Swedish neuroscientist and pioneer in the study of cell- and gene-based reparative and neuroprotective mechanisms in the brain. He has spent his academic career at Lund University in Sweden, as professo ...

of the

University of Lund , motto = Ad utrumque , mottoeng = Prepared for both , established = , type = Public research university , budget = SEK 9 billion Prof Elena Cattaneo
Unimi.it. Retrieved 10 August 2015 Returning to Italy she started her academic career in the

. She lived in

Brugherio Brugherio (; in lmo, Brughee ) is a '' comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Monza and Brianza in the Italian region Lombardy, located about northeast of Milan. It was established December 9, 1866 unifying the suppressed municipalities of ...

and worked in Milan.Life senator
MBNews. Retrieved 9 August 2015 She is now full professor at the Laboratory of Stem Cell Biology and Pharmacology of Neurodegenerative Diseases in the Department of Biosciences of University of Milan. Napolitano and Cattaneo

Cattaneo was appointed to the

Senate of Italy The Senate of the Republic ( it, Senato della Repubblica), or simply the Senate ( it, Senato), is the upper house of the bicameral Italian Parliament (the other being the Chamber of Deputies). The two houses together form a perfect bicameral s ...

as a

Senator for life A senator for life is a member of the senate or equivalent upper chamber of a legislature who has life tenure. , six Italian senators out of 206, two out of the 41 Burundian senators, one Congolese senator out of 109, and all members of the B ...

, the youngest in Italian history, by then President

Giorgio Napolitano Giorgio Napolitano (; born 29 June 1925) is an Italian politician who served as president of Italy from 2006 to 2015, the first Italian president to be re-elected to the presidency. Due to his dominant position in Italian politics, some critics ...

on 30 August 2013, along with

Claudio Abbado Claudio Abbado (; 26 June 1933 – 20 January 2014) was an Italian conductor who was one of the leading conductors of his generation. He served as music director of the La Scala opera house in Milan, principal conductor of the London Symphony ...

Renzo Piano Renzo Piano (; born 14 September 1937) is an Italian architect. His notable buildings include the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris (with Richard Rogers, 1977), The Shard in London (2012), the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City (2 ...

and

Carlo Rubbia Carlo Rubbia (born 31 March 1934) is an Italian particle physicist and inventor who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1984 with Simon van der Meer for work leading to the discovery of the W and Z particles at CERN. Early life and educatio ...

.Giorgio Napolitano nomina Claudio Abbado, Renzo Piano, Carlo Rubbia e Elena Cattaneo senatori a vita
''The Huffington Post'', August 2013, in Italian. Retrieved 10 August 2015 Of his choice of her as Senator for Life, President Napolitano said: "choosing her is meant as an appreciation and an encouragement for many Italians of the new generations who commit themselves, amid difficulties, to scientific research”. Cattaneo has used her position to oppose unfounded claims made by companies offering stem cell remedies. The scientifically unsupported claims were primarily being made by a private well-connected company called the Stamina Foundation which had been started in 2009. The

Stamina therapy Stamina therapy (also known as ''Stamina method'' or simply ''Stamina'') was a controversial and unproven treatment marketed in Italy by convicted Quackery, quack Davide Vannoni during 2007–2014. Mainly aimed at Neurodegeneration, neurodegenerati ...

involved recommending stem cells for a range of conditions with little or no scientific proof of their efficacy. Journalists including prestigious employees of the journal ''

Nature Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...

'' were lied to and threatened. The scientific community's consensus was against Stamina. Stamina took advantage of the well meaning supporters of very ill people who believed that Stamina's claims was their only hope. In 2012 the debate appeared to be settled when the Italian Medicines Agency declared Stamina's methods unsafe, however the Foundation appealed to their supporters and they appealed to the politicians and the courts. The courts cited compassion as the reason that they gave in to many of the 450 appeals who demanded the courts should allow patients to receive the stem cell "panacea". Some politicians went further and used government money to fund a multi-million-pound trial. It was not until August 2014 that a court in Turin demanded that not only should Stamina stop but their equipment should also be confiscated. This was possible because of the support of Cattaneo, a senator. As soon as Cattaneo became a senator she used her senatorial powers to demand evidence against Stamina that others had been denied. January 2014 saw the beginning of 25 hearings by the 15-strong enquiry. The eventual enquiry report demanded a number of points including that courts should always have scientific representation in cases of this sort. It was reported that the "Stamina case ... shows the influence that individual scientists can have in fighting anti-science forces." Cattaneo has also been awarded the ''Medaglia teresiana'' by the

University of Pavia The University of Pavia ( it, Università degli Studi di Pavia, UNIPV or ''Università di Pavia''; la, Alma Ticinensis Universitas) is a university located in Pavia, Lombardy, Italy. There was evidence of teaching as early as 1361, making it one ...

, in 2013. In 2015, ''Nature'' dedicated an editorial to laud the work that Cattaneo and her supporters had achieved. In 2016, Cattaneo helped raising concerns about three anti-GMO papers by Federico Infascelli at the

University of Naples The University of Naples Federico II ( it, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II) is a public university in Naples, Italy. Founded in 1224, it is the oldest public non-sectarian university in the world, and is now organized into 26 depar ...

, which were later retracted from

. Nature News reported that Cattaneo found that certain images in those papers had been deleted or tampered with, and that some images in different studies were identical, despite captions claiming that they were the results of novel experiments. Her suspicions led to an investigation by the University of Naples, which also found evidence of data manipulation. In 2017, Cattaneo and Ignacio Munoz-Sanjuan organized the event HD as part of a campaign called HDdennomore, pronounced “Hidden no more” (HD is an acronym for the

Huntington's disease Huntington's disease (HD), also known as Huntington's chorea, is a neurodegenerative disease that is mostly inherited. The earliest symptoms are often subtle problems with mood or mental abilities. A general lack of coordination and an uns ...

), which aims to relieve families of the stigma of the disease, particularly those in poor communities in South America where the condition is most common. The event was brought about after Cattaneo wrote to

Pope Francis Pope Francis ( la, Franciscus; it, Francesco; es, link=, Francisco; born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 17 December 1936) is the head of the Catholic Church. He has been the bishop of Rome and sovereign of the Vatican City State since 13 March 2013 ...

last summer and asked him to meet with someone with the disease. In 2018, Cattaneo was selected to be a new honorary doctor at the Faculty of Medicine at

Lund University , motto = Ad utrumque , mottoeng = Prepared for both , established = , type = Public research university , budget = SEK 9 billion Scientists from Bergamo 1962 births Italian life senators Living people Italian women scientists Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni University of Milan faculty