Lucio Barile

Lucio Barile is group leader of Laboratory for Cardiovascular Theranostics at Istituto Cardiocentro Ticino_Ente Ospedaliero Cantonale, Lugano, Switzerland.

His research interests are largely direct towards understanding pathophysiological mechanisms underlying cardiovascular diseases and focuses on finding novel cell-free approach to promote successful cardioprotection and myocardial regeneration to prevent heart failure.

He holds PhD in “Experimental Medicine” obtained in 2008 at University of Rome “La Sapienza”. During his PhD, he was visitor student at the Institute of Molecular Cardiobiology, Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, USA. Dr. Barile was part of a research team that developed a method for the isolation of adult human resident progenitor cells (CPC) from endomyocardial biopsy specimens. After coming back to Italy he worked as postdoc in the department of Molecular Medicine at ICGEB Trieste Component, studying the homologous recombination in cardiac progenitor cells by AAV-mediated gene targeting and studying the activation of Notch pathway into cardiac progenitors.

From 2009 to 2011, he worked at the Department of Biotechnology and Biosciences, University of Milano, Bicocca,  providing first novel insights into electrophysiology properties of differentiated CPC. He moved to Cardiocentro Ticino Foundation (FCCT), Switzerland in 2011 as senior scientist and lab coordinator of Laboratory for Cellular and Molecular Cardiology.

Dr. Barile contributed to establish a research topic of secreted extracellular vesicles (exosomes) derived from CPC resulting in publication in 2014 among the very first reports on such topic. Research on exosomes has had in the recent years a wide international resonance; in November 2016, he has been invited as speaker for the America Heart Association Meeting (NewOrleans, LA) in a scientific session entitled “Frontiers in Science Paracrine Mediators of Stem Cell Bioactivity”.

He is currently Swiss Member (CA16225 CH) of EU-CARDIOPROTECTION COST Action, which is a pan-European research network aiming to improve the translation of novel experimental cardioprotective therapies into the clinical setting for patient benefit. He has been appointed by the European Society of Cardiology for a Working Group on Cardiovascular Regenerative & Reparative Medicine.