PhD Cicchetti Alessandro

Researcher and Group Leader at Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori, with a background in medical physics and a PhD in applied physics to medicine, specializing in radiobiology.

His research focuses on the development of predictive models for clinical outcomes and toxicity in patients undergoing radiotherapy. Recent studies include projects in cardio-oncology, analyzing cardiac risk in patients treated with radiotherapy or anti-VEGF therapies.

He is an active member of the working groups of the European Society for Radiotherapy and Oncology (ESTRO) and Cancer Core Europe (CCE).

Ongoing research projects:

• Principal Investigator of Location Matters – MFAG AIRC, a study on the role of cardiac substructure dose and imaging parameters in assessing the risk of cardiac complications after treatment in patients with locally advanced lung cancer.
  Participating centers: IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele (Milan), IRCCS Istituto Nazionale Tumori Regina Elena (Rome), AUSL-IRCCS Ospedale di Reggio Emilia, Azienda Ospedaliera Universitaria Careggi (Florence), Ospedale Bellaria di Bologna, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario Agostino Gemelli (Rome), Karolinska Hospital (Stockholm), Maastricht University Hospital (The Netherlands).
• Co-Principal Investigator of RAPID Solution – 5x1000 Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori, developing models to identify, during CT planning for radiotherapy, breast cancer patients who may benefit from deep inspiration breath-hold techniques to minimize cardiac exposure and late cardiac toxicity.
• Lead of modeling analysis for BIONCARD – 5x1000 Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori, investigating the effects of anti-VEGF treatments in a cancer-agnostic cohort. The project aims to identify imaging-based biomarkers to predict treatment interruption or reintroduction before the onset of cardiac complications, and to explore correlations between systemic microvascular parameters, tumor response, and microcirculatory damage.