Biosketch
Biosketch:
My research focuses on applying biomechanical principles to enhance the diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular diseases. Over the years, I've acquired substantial expertise in utilizing various finite-element techniques such as CFD, FEM, and FSI, alongside experimental mechanics. This expertise aids in comprehending the pathophysiological mechanisms driving disease progression. I take pride in a publication track record of >100 peer-reviewed articles in clinical and bioengineering journals (according to Scopus. Currently, I lead a research team comprising four PhD students, all of whom are supported by personal funding. My role has been recognized through awards as a Principal Investigator from both public (Italian Ministry of Health, H2020) and private funding bodies (eg, Edwards and Fondazione RiMED). Teaching biomechanics in an advanced course has been a fulfilling aspect of my career. I've also supervised numerous graduate and PhD students from national and international academic institutions. Previously, I held a leadership position in the cardiovascular engineering program at IRCCS ISMETT and maintain close collaboration with clinicians, providing crucial support for their decision-making processes..
A. Education
2008 Doctorate of Philosophy (PhD), Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Palermo, Palermo (Italy)
2004 Master of Engineering (MEng), Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Palermo, Palermo (Italy)
B. Past Positions
2006-2007 PhD visiting student, Department of Mechanics, University of South Carolina, Columbia (USA)
2008-2009 Post-doc fellowship (granted by MIUR), Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Palermo, Italy.
2009–2012 Research Associate, Vascular Bioengineering Laboratory, McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh (USA)
2009-2019 Principal Investigator (permanent position), Fondazione RiMED, Italy
2011-2019 Research associate, Mediterranean Institute for Transplantation and Advanced Specialized Therapies (ISMETT) - IRCCS, Italy (ahead of cardiovascular engineering program)
2014-current National Scientific Qualification as Professor of Mechanical Engineering, Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research (MIUR), Italy
2017-current National Scientific Qualification as Professor of Industrial Bioengineering, Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research (MIUR), Italy
C. Awards
2008 Young Research Award, International Conference on Residual Stress (ICRS-08), August 4-6,
2010 Young Research Award, 39th Conference of Italian Association for Mechanical Engineering, September 7-10, 2010, Maratea, Italy,
2013 Travel Grant Award, 27th Annual Meeting of the European Association for Cardio-Thoracic Surgery, October 5-9, 2013, Vienna, Austria,
2017 Young Research Award “ Vincenzo Masini”, National Congress of Cardiology 2017, Rimini, May 11-13, 2017
2018 Best Paper Awards (co-investigator), Department of Industrial and Digital Innovation (DIID), University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy.
2018 Start-UP & Innovation Competition Award, 39th National Congress Italian Society of Interventional Cardiology, 16-19 October, Milan, Italy
2019 Certificate for Highly Cited Research in Journal of Biomechanics, top 10 most cited article in the last 5 years (2013-2018)
C. Supervision of Students and Postdoctoral Fellow
2011 Exchange student program: Dr. Jake Lee; "Predicting the clinical evolution of Type B aortic dissection" ISMETT-UPMC Summer Program, School of Medicine at University of Pittsburgh (USA) and IRCCS ISMETT (Italy).
2013 Exchange student program: Dr. Bryan Wu; "Surgery of ascending thoracic aortic aneurysm: bicuspid versus tricuspid aortic valve population" ISMETT-UPMC Summer Program, School of Medicine at University of Pittsburgh (USA) and IRCCS ISMETT (Italy)
2017 Exchange student program: Mr. Drake Pedersen "Particle image velocimetry of electrospun tri-leaflets valves", Whitaker Foundation, Bioengineering School at University of Pittsburgh (USA) and Dipartimento dell'Innovazione Industriale e Digitale (DIID), at Università di Palermo (Italy)
2018 Exchange student program: Dr. Casey Thompkins; "Computational modelling of heart valves" ISMETT-UPMC Summer Program, School of Medicine at University of Pittsburgh (USA) and IRCCS ISMETT (Italy)
2018 Exchange student program: Mr. Vincent Mendez, School of Bioeingeneering, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausannee (EPFL) in collaboration with RiMED (Italy).
2018 Doctoral student supervising: Federica Cosentino "Mechanical Modeling of Aortic Aneuyrysms", Università di Palermo, Italy - Course: Tecnologie e Scienze per la Salute Dell'Uomo (dottorato ciclo XXXIII) AA2018/2019.
â–ª Recipients of “Ernst Mach Grant” 2019, Austria
â–ª Recipients of ERASMUS +, UniPA 2019
2018 Doctoral student supervising: Marzio Di Giuseppe "Failure Mechanisms of Aortic Aneurysm", Università di Palermo, Italy - Course: Tecnologie e Scienze per la Salute Dell'Uomo (dottorato ciclo XXXIII) AA2018/2019.
â–ª Recipients of ERASMUS +, UniPA 2019
2020 Doctoral student supervising: Salvatore Cutugno "Patient-Specific Simulations of Transcathther Heart Valves", Università di Palermo, Italy - Course: Mechanical, Manufacturing, Management and Aerospace Innovation (dottorato ciclo XXXVI) AA2020/2021.
2019-current Doctoral student supervising: Chiara Catalano "Simulation of TAVI and TMVR", Università di Palermo, Italy - Mechanical, Manufacturing, Management and Aerospace Innovation (dottorato ciclo XXXVIII) AA2021/2022.
â–ª funded by H2020 SimInSitu
2020-current Doctoral student supervising: Roberta Scuoppo "Uncertainty Quantification in TAVI by computational modeling", Università di Palermo, Italy - Mechanical, Manufacturing, Management and Aerospace Innovation (dottorato ciclo XXXVIII) AA2021/2022.
â–ª funded by H2020 SimInSitu
2020-current Doctoral student supervising: Fabrizio Crascì "Mixed Reality and 3D printing for Structural Heart Intervention", Università di Palermo, Italy - Mechanical, Manufacturing, Management and Aerospace Innovation (dottorato ciclo XXXVIII) AA2021/2022.
â–ª funded by PNRR
2021-current Doctoral student supervising: Eleonora Costagliola "Mixed Reality for Structural Heart Intervention", Università di Palermo, Italy - Mechanical, Manufacturing, Management and Aerospace Innovation (dottorato ciclo XXXVIII) AA2021/2022.
2008-current Advisor of many master students (near 20 students) and graduate student (near 10 students), Università di Palermo, Italy
D. Advanced Teaching Activities
2016 Biomechanics, 40 hrs course – Advanced teaching programme organized by Lima Corporate for engineers and biologists (PON-01-01287), University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy
2017 Modelli Matematici nel Virtual Physiology Human, 4 hrs course – Advanced teaching programme organized by Distretto Tecnologico Sicilia Micro e Nano Sistemi (PON02_00355_2964193)
2018 Principles of biomechanics, high school course n.12 hours - STEM (Science, Tecnology, Engineering, Mathematics) at Istituto Gonzaga, Palermo, Italy.
2018 Member of Doctorate Committee in “Tecnologie e Scienze per la Salute Dell'Uomo”, Università degli Studi di Palermo, (DOT1720429).
2019-current Member of Doctorate Committee in “Mechanical, Manufacturing, Management and Aerospace Innovation, Università degli Studi di Palermo (D086).
E. Grants
2011 Ministry of Health – Young Researcher 2011-2012 Title: Hemodynamic and Biomarkers for Clinical Risk Stratification of Ascending Thoracic Aortic Aneurysm with Bicuspid Aortic Valve (GR-2011-02348129),PI: S Pasta (budget € 445.445,00)
2012 Fondo Finalizzato Ricerca 2011-2012, Universita’ di Palermo Title: “Caratterizzazione meccanica di tessuti dell’aneurisma aortico ascendente” co-PI: S Pasta (budget € 6.000,00)
2009 Fondazione RiMED, Title: Biomechanics of Ascending Thoracic Aortic Aneurysms; PI: S Pasta (budget € 250.000)
2018 PON FSE-FESR Ricerca e Innovazione 2014-2020 - Azione I.1 Dottorati innovativi con caratterizzazione industriale, MIUR Title: Modeling micromeccanico della patologie aortiche - Micromechanical Modeling of Aortic Pathologies (DOT1720429-2), (budget € 60.000,00 covering a PhD student for n.3 years)
2019 Ministry of Education, Universities and Research (MIUR) – PNR 2015–2020 Title: 4 FRAILTY – Sensoristica intelligente, infrastrutture e modelli gestionali per la sicurezza di soggetti fragili (ARS01_00345), co-PI: S. Pasta (budget € 300.736,15; under funding)
2020 Italian SuperComputing Resource Allocation (ISCRA Cineca)
Title: Computational Modeling of Ascending Thoracic Aortic Aneurysms: Towards Personalized Risk Strategies (HP10CWH78U), PI: S Pasta (budget 15 hours on GALILEO2 and 30hours on MARCONI100)
2020 Network for Research in Vascular Aging - VascAgeNet- Cost Action Horizon2020; Member S. Pasta
2020 European Research Council – Consolidator Grant
Title: Engineering the mitral valve: bioinspired control of structure and function for enhanced in-vivo performance - BIOMITRAL,
co-investigator: S Pasta (budget € 21.000,00)
2020 Horizon 2020 - SC1-DTH-06-2020 - European Union Framework Programme for Research and Innovation
Title: In-silico Development- and Clinical-Trial-Platform for Testing in-situ Tissue Engineered Heart Valves - SimInSitu, -
PI: S Pasta; WP leader: WP4 and 9 (budget € 675.454,00);
2021 Edwards Lifescience - Research Grant
Title: Simulations for the Pre-Procedural Planning of the Transcatheter Mitral Valve Repair with the SAPIEN 3 - Sim4SAPIEN,
PI: S Pasta (budget € 24.000,00)
2021 Ministry of Health – Piano Operativo Salute
Title: Building AHA - Building Living Spaces and. Smart - Building AHA,
Collaborator: S Pasta (budget € 617.999,0)
2022 Ministry of Education, Universities and Research (MIUR) – PRIN2022
Title: Artificial intelligence-powered Support System for Ascending Aorta Aneurysm (ASSOCIATE) (2022L7KK7L),
PI: S. Pasta (budget € 86.345,0)
F. Commission of Trust
2008-current Reviewer for Circulation, American Journal of Physiology - Heart and Circulatory Physiology, Medical Engineering & Physics, Journal of Biomechanics, Annals of Thoracic Surgery, Computers in Biology and Medicine, Journal of Endovascular Therapy, Journal of Engineering in Medicine
- More information on Publons (https://publons.com/a/1622567)
2015 Editor of Special Issue "Frontier Biomechanical Challenges in Cardiovascular Physiopathology" in Medical Engineering & Physics
2017 Grant Reviewer for Swiss National Science Foundation, Swiss
2017 Grant Reviewer PRIN 2017 for Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research (MIUR)
2018 Grant Reviewer for National Center of Scientific and Technical Evaluation (NCSTE)”, Kazakhstan
2018-current Editorial Board of Medical Engineering & Physics, Elsevier
2019 Assessorato regionale attività produttive, Roster ET 4, PO-FESR 2014-2020, Region of Sicily, Italy
2019-current Member of the Living Heart Project, Mitral Valve Special Interest Group, Dassault Systèmes
2020 Grant Reviewer for the Austrian Science Foundation, Austria
2020 Editorial Board of Prosthesis, MDPI
2020 Editorial Board of Biomechanics, MDPI
2020 Advisory Board/Commitee of MDPI publisher
2021 Reviewer of PhD Student's thesis final defence at Politecnico di Torino, Politecnico di Milano, University of Pisa
2023 Grant Reviewer for for Fundacio La Marato, Spain
G. Organization of Scientific Meeting
2016 Chairman and Organization of the Symposium "Frontier Biomechanical Challenges in Cardiovascular Physiopathology", Palermo, Italy, September 8-9, 2016
2016 Organization committee of XXXII LIAC Meeting on Vascular Research. Ustica (Italy), 14-17 September 2016
2017 Session chairman at International Conference on Experimental Mechanics (ICEM-13), Alexandroupolis, Greece, July 1-6, 2007
2017 Scientific committee of the conference “International Conference on Biomedical Technology (ICBT 2017)”, Hannover, Germany, November, 6-8, 2017
2017 Scientific committee of the conference “ESB-ITA - VII Annual Meeting”, Rome, Italy, September, 28-29, 2017
2018 Organization committee of Management of Heart Failure: Current Challenges and Future Perspectives. Palermo (Italy), 07-09 July 2018
2019 Session chairman of Session “PO.16: Cardiovascular / fluid and respiratory” at 25th Congress of the European Society of Biomechanics (ESB2019), Wien, Austria, July 7-11, 2019
2019 Scientific committee of the conference “ESB-ITA - IX Annual Meeting”, Bologna, Italy, September, 30, October 1, 2019;
2019 Session chairman of Session “Thematic Symposium Biomechanics for in silico clinical trials” at ESB-ITA - IX Annual Meeting”, Bologna, Italy, September 30, 2019;
2020 Scientific committee of Scuola Internazionale Avanzata Biomeccanica, Campus Biomedico, Roma, Italy, February 24-28, 2020
2023 Session chairman of Session “Cardiovascular Biomechanics” at ESB-ITA, Turin, Italy, September 18-19, 2023;
H. Invited Talk
2011 Lecture magistralis at RiMED’s Symposium for the meeting of 2011, 2015, and 2018.
2008 Invited talk on "Residual Stress in FSW joints", ICRS-08 International conference, August 4-6, Denver (CO), 2008. USA.
2013 Invited talk at Computational Mechanics & Advanced Materials Group, University of Pavia, Pavia, October 11, 2013, Italy
2013 Invited talk at Laboratory for Modeling and Scientific Computing (MOX), Politecnico di Milano, Milan, March 11, 2013, Italy
2015 Lecture magistralis at Infoday, Ministero della Salute, Palermo, Jannuary 22, 2015, Italy
2017 Invited talk at Center for Biomedical and Healthcare Engineering, University Mines Saint-Etienne, Jannuary 31 – February 3, 2017, France
2018 Invited talk at “Management of Heart Failure: Current Challenges and Future Perspectives. Palermo (Italy), 07-09 July 2018
2018 Invited speaker at “Focus on TAVI” organized by ISMETT-IRCCS Palermo (Italy), 04 May 2018
2018 Invited talk at “Mathematical and Numerical Modeling of the Cardiovascular System - INdAM Workshop”, April 16-19, 2018, Rome, Italy
2018 Invited seminar at Società Italiana di Chirurgia Cardiaca (SICCH), Novembre 23-25, 2018, Roma, Italy
2019 Invited talk at “new frontiers from Preclinical studies to Clinical applications". Catania (Italy), 10 May 2019
2020 Invited talk at “Management of Cardiovascular Diseases: A Look At The Present and a Glance Into The Future. Focus On Aortic Valve Disease And Heart Failure". Palermo (Italy), 20-24 June 2020
2021 Invited talk at “7th Intetnational Symposium on the Living Heart Project". webinar, 7-8 December 2021
2023 Invited talk at “Mitral Valve Special Interest Group, Dassault Systèmes, 23 September 2023
I. Patent
2018 Inventor: Pasta S., C. Scardulla; Applicant: ISMETT IRCCS, Fondazione RiMED. Title: Method and system for the risk stratification of an ascending thoracic aortic aneurysm; WO2018220573 A1;
F. Collaborations
2009-current Dr. V. Badhwar, Dr. Antonio D'Amore and Dr. Wiliam R. Wagner and "Flow dynamic evaluation of electrospun artificial valve by particle image velocimetry and computational modeling", University of Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Output:
n.1 paper;
n.1 grant application for ERC-2020-COG;
n.1 invited seminar for ESB-ITA Thematic Symposium, 2016
2007-current Prof David A. Vorp, PhD, and Thomas G. Gleason, MD, "Biomechanics of Aortic Aneurysm", University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh (PA), USA
Output:
n.7 paper;
n.2 exchange of student from Palermo to Pittsburgh;
n.1 Scientific meeting;
2015-current Prof. Alfio Quarteroni, "Computational Fluid Dynamic Modelling of Gastrointestinal Bleeding in Continuous-Flow Ventricular Assistant Device", Ecole Polytechnique de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland,
Output:
n.2 paper;
n.1 grant application for H2020-PHC-2015-single-stage;
n.2 invited lecture at IRCCS ISMETT
2018-current Prof. Stephane Avril, "Micromechanics of ascending thoracic aortic aneurysm”, Saint-Etienne, France.
Output:
n.2 paper;
n.1 exchange of a PhD student for 1 year
2018-current Dr. Hector Michelena. “Prognostic significance of aortic wall strain in bicuspid patients”, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, USA
Output:
n.2 paper;
2019-current Prof. Julius Guccione. “Computational Cardiac Mechanics”, University of California, San Francisco, San Diego, USA
Output:
n.1 invited lecture at University of Palermo, September 2020;
n.1 paper
2019-current Prof. Gerard Holzapfel. “Constitutive Modeling of Ascending Aorta with Microstructural Parameters”, TU Graz, Austria
â–ª Output:
â–ª n.1 exchange of a PhD student for 8 months
n.1 paper
G. Membership
2012-current European Society of Biomechanics (ESB)
2012-current Capitolo Italiano of ESB (ESB-ITA)
2009-2011 Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES)
2009-2011 American Association of Mechanical Engineers (ASME)
H. Media Press
2010 The Evolution of Excellence – University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine – “The Pittsburgh-Palermo Promise: Reaching out with RiMED”, April 2010
2014 Newsletter del el Capitolo Italiano della European Society of Biomechanics, 2014
2017 Tecnica Ospedaliera – “Aneurisma Aortico: un Modello per Prevedere Quando è Necessario Operare”, May, 2017
2017 Il Gattopardo – “Qui si Studia la Nuova Medicina”, April 2017
2017 Il Sole 24 ore “ Il Database che Identifica il Rischio al Cuore”, 2017
2018 Fondazione Menarini “In-Silico Modeling for the Clinical Risk Stratification of Ascending Aortic Aneurysm”, 2018
2020 Cardiology Advisor “ Model May Improve Decision Making for Ascending Aortic Aneurysms”, 2020
