Claudio Vernieri

Claudio Vernieri, M.D. Ph.D., specialized in Clinical Oncology and Cancer Metabolism.
Since January 2020 he directs the Metabolic Reprogramming in Solid Tumors program at IFOM, and works as a medical oncologist in the Breast Unit of Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori.

He was born in 1984, Naples (Italy). In 2008 he graduated with honors in Medicine and Surgery at the University Federico II of Naples. In 2014 he obtained his PhD in Molecular Medicine (Human Genetics and Molecular Oncology) in Andrea Ciliberto’s Lab in IFOM, where he studied mechanisms of eukaryotic cell adaptation to prolonged cell cycle arrest in mitosis and Spindle Assembly Checkpoint (SAC) activation.

During his PhD studies, Dr. Vernieri found that the phosphorylation of Anaphase Promoting Complex (APC) subunits by Cyclin-Dependent Kinase 1 (CDK1) are essential for eukaryotic cell adaptation to the SAC, while the Protein Phosphatase 2A (PP2A) reverses CDK1-induced phosphorylation of the APC, thus delaying the onset of cell adaptation.

In 2014 Dr. Vernieri moved to the Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori (INT) di Milano (Italy) for his residency in Medical Oncology under the supervision Prof. Filippo de Braud’s group. There, he focused on clinical and translational research activities on cancer metabolism and breast cancer, giving an important contribution to the design and conduction of independent clinical trials aimed at assessing the safety, feasibility and anticancer activity of specific metabolic interventions, such as calorie restricted diets and metformin, in different cancer patient populations.

Since December 2019 Dr. Vernieri is a Specialist in Medical Oncology, and in January 2020 he has been recruited at IFOM to start an independent research group focused on the study of metabolic reprogramming in solid tumors.