Prof. Federica Sallusto elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences

On May 3, 2022, Federica Sallusto has been elected, member of the U. S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS), one of the most significant and highest honors given to academic researchers.

The NAS announced on May 3, 2022 the election of its members in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research. The NAS is a private, non-profit society of distinguished scholars. Established by an Act of Congress, signed by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863, the NAS is charged with providing independent, objective advice to the US nation on matters related to science and technology. Scientists are elected by their peers to membership in the NAS for outstanding contributions to research. Members must be US citizens; non-US citizens are elected as foreign associates, with a maximum of 30 elected annually. Current NAS membership totals approximately 2,500 members and 500 international members, of which approximately 190 have received Nobel prizes.

Federica Sallusto, Group leader at the IRB and Professor at USI and the ETHZ, has been inducted to the NAS as an international member in recognition of her ground-breaking contributions to Immunology. Sallusto received the degree of Doctor in Biology from the University of Rome and performed postdoctoral work at the Istituto Superiore di Sanità in Rome. She was a member of  the Basel Institute for Immunology before moving in 2000 to the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB) in Bellinzona to lead the Cellular Immunology Laboratory and where she has also established the Center of Medical Immunology. Since 2017, she has been a Full Professor of Medical Immunology at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH Zürich) and Università della Svizzera italiana (USI), Faculty of Biomedical Sciences. Prof. Sallusto's professorship was established thanks to generous donations from the Helmut Horten Foundation.

This appointment once more testifies Federica Sallusto’s scientific achievements, which have been already acknowledged by many awards and prestigious memberships appointments. She is a member of the German Academy of Science Leopoldina and of EMBO, of the National Research Council of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and of the Board of Trustees of the Marcel Benoist Foundation. From 2013 to 2015, she acted as president of the Swiss Society for Allergology and Immunology and is currently President of the European Federation of Immunological Societies (EFIS).