Andrea Zitolo

Zitolo, who was born in the Province of L'Aquila, Abruzzo, grew up in Ladispoli, a seaside city that is currently part of the Metropolitan City of Rome Capital. After his diploma at the Liceo Scientifico Sandro Pertini, he started his studies at Sapienza University of Rome. He graduated in chemistry with a specialization in physical chemistry and top marks (110 cum laude/110). At the same university, he obtained his PhD in Chemical Sciences with a thesis on “Structural investigation of lanthanoid coordination: a combined XAS and Molecular Dynamics study” and he started his career as researcher. Years after, he moved to Paris, to work at the Synchrotron Soleil, where he is currently employed as scientist. Italian press said he moved to France "in order to revolution the world of low-cost energy".[2] On 2020 he obtained a Agence nationale de la recherche grant to start and coordinate “Spetroscope”,[3] an in operando X-ray Absorption Spectroscopy (XAS) study of novel non-precious metal electrocatalysts.

Although his works are mostly published in English, he is fluent in Italian, French and English.

On 2 June 2017 the President of the Italian Republic Sergio Mattarella nominated him Knight of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic for his contribution to the advancement of Science and in January 2018, the French Minister of Education Jean-Michel Blanquer nominated him Knight of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques.[4]

He is also Editorial Board Member for the Springer Nature Group.[5]

On 2015, his discoveries on material science have been published on Nature Materials. Particularly, Zitolo, through his collaboration with the University of Montpellier, significantly improved global knowledge on fuel cells and oxygen reduction.[6][7][8]

His pioneering research[9] interest focuses on the application of x ray absorption spectroscopy in understanding the structure and properties of PEM fuel cell catalysts.[10][11][12]

After his works on the possibility of obtaining energy from hydrogen through non-precious catalysts, he declared during an interview to Radio24 that he is confident to have these products on the market in the next few years [13] - two years later, a Canadian fuel cell company, Ballard, declared to launch in late 2017 the first fuel cell stack that incorporates a non-precious catalyst of the Japanese Nisshinbo group.[14]

On 2016, among other Italian celebrities, he served as Testimonial for the World Water Day campaign of the Green Cross, advocating on the need of saving and protecting natural resources such as Water and showing their importance for the advancement of Science.[15]

Sensitive to the issues related to the transformation of the Higher-Education System and Research, consequently affecting the evolution of young researchers' career in STEM, he highlights the need of bridging the gap between institutions and investigators to answer to the new claims and needs of young scientists.[16][17][18]