Developed skills and lines of research

Livia Leoni is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biology at Roma Tre University and holds the chair of Microbial Biotechnology. Her research primarily focuses on Pseudomonas aeruginosa as a model organism and is divided into the following areas:

• Understanding bacterial pathogenesis and biofilm formation;
• Developing high-throughput screening systems for identifying new compounds targeting bacterial biofilms;
• Screening FDA-approved drug libraries to repurpose “old” drugs as new anti-virulence agents and for anti-biofilm therapies.

She is the co-author of over 78 publications in international journals, two peer-reviewed book chapters, and two patents.

Projects funded by FFC Ricerca as Principal Investigator

FFC#17/2018
Drug repurposing for antivirulence therapy against Pseudomonas aeruginosa

FFC#10/2013
Anti-virulence therapy against Pseudomonas aeruginosa: identification of antibiofilm drugs and development of inhalable Niclosamide and Flucytosine formulations

FFC#13/2011
Identification and characterization of novel drugs suppressing Pseudomonas aeruginosa virulence in chronic infection

FFC#8/2008
Development and validation of a novel screening system for the identification of Pseudomonas aeruginosa virulence inhibitor

Projects financed by FFC Ricerca as a partner

FFC#14/2010
Non-conventional strategies against Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection: interference with iron homeostasis and quorum sensing

FFC#10/2007
Iron uptake and quorum sensing in Pseudomonas aeruginosa virulencee

Publications from FFC Research projects

• Rampioni G, Schuster M, Greenberg EP, et al. Contribution of the RsaL global regulator to Pseudomonas aeruginosa virulence and biofilm formation. FEMS Microbiol Lett, 2009 Dec;301(2):210-7
• Imperi F, Tiburzi F, Visca P. Molecular basis of pyoverdine siderophore recycling in Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2009 Dec 1;106(48):20440-5. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0908760106. Epub 2009 Nov 11
• Imperi F, Tiburzi F, Fimia GM, Visca P. Transcriptional control of the pvdS iron starvation sigma factor gene by the master regulator of sulfur metabolism CysB in Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Environ Microbiol. 2010 Jun;12(6):1630-42
• Massai F, Imperi F, Quattrucci S, et al. A multitask biosensor for micro-volumetric detection of N-3-oxo-dodecanoyl-homoserine lactone quorum sensing signal. Biosens Bioelectron. 2011 Apr 15;26(8):3444-9
• Stano P, Rampioni G, Carrara P et al. Semi-synthetic minimal cells as a tool for biochemical ICT. Biosystems. 2012 Jul;109(1):24-34. doi: 10.1016/j.biosystems.2012.01.002. Epub 2012 Jan 12
• Imperi F, Massai F, Ramachandran Pillai C et al. New life for an old drug: the anthelmintic drug niclosamide inhibits Pseudomonas aeruginosa quorum sensing. Antimicrob Agents Chemother. 2013 Feb;57(2):996-1005. doi: 10.1128/AAC.01952-12. Epub 2012 Dec 17
• Imperi F, Massai F, Facchini M, et al. Repurposing the antimycotic drug flucytosine for suppression of Pseudomonas aeruginosa pathogenicity. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2013 Apr 30;110(18):7458-63. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1222706110. Epub 2013 Apr 8
• Rampioni G, Leoni L, Williams P. The art of antibacterial warfare: Deception through interference with quorum sensing-mediated communication. Bioorg Chem. 2014 Aug;55:60-8. doi: 10.1016/j.bioorg.2014.04.005. Epub 2014 Apr 21
• Imperi F, Leoni L, Visca P. Antivirulence activity of azitrhomycin in Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Front Microbiol, 2014 Apr 22;5:178. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2014.00178. eCollection 2014
• Bondí R, Messina M, De Fino I, et al. Affecting pseudomonas aeruginosa phenotypic plasticity by quorum sensing dysregulation hampers pathogenicity in murine chronic lung infection. PLoS One, 2014 Nov 24;9(11):e112105
• Costabile G, d’Angelo I, Rampioni G et al. Toward Repositioning Niclosamide for Antivirulence Therapy of Pseudomonas aeruginosa Lung Infections: Development of Inhalable Formulations through Nanosuspension Technology. Mol Pharm. 2015 Aug 3;12(8):2604-17. doi: 10.1021/acs.molpharmaceut.5b00098. Epub 2015 May 27
• Lo Sciuto A, Martorana AM, Fernández-Piñar R, et al., Pseudomonas aeruginosa LptE is crucial for LptD assembly, cell envelope integrity, antibiotic resistance and virulence. Virulence. 2018;9(1):1718-1733
• Imperi F, Fiscarelli EV, Visaggio D, Leoni L, Visca P. Activity and Impact on Resistance Development of Two Antivirulence Fluoropyrimidine Drugs in Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2019 Mar 11;9:49. doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2019.00049. eCollection 2019.
• Francesca D’Angelo, Valerio Baldelli, Nigel Halliday, et al. Identification of FDA-Approved Drugs as Antivirulence Agents Targeting the pqs Quorum-Sensing System of Pseudomonas Aeruginosa. Antimicrob Agents Chemother, 62 (11) 2018 Oct 24
• Marta Mellini, Elena Di Muzio, Francesca D’Angelo, et al. In silico Selection and Experimental Validation of FDA-Approved Drugs as Anti-quorum Sensing Agents. Front Microbiol. 2019; 10: 2355.a