I was born in Taranto, in the south of Italy on May 11th, 1969. 

I lived in my hometown on the Ionic sea until the end of the 80ties. 

After the high school I moved to Bologna, where I took my master degree in Astronomy in 1993. I got a scholarship in 1994 to work for a year at the National Laboratories of Nuclear Physics in Gran Sasso, and at the same time I enrolled at the department of physics of La Sapienza University in Rome. In 1996 I also got the master in Physics. 

In 1997 I left Italy to move to Bonn, where I worked at the Max Planck Institute for Radio-Astronomy for 3 years, and I got the PhD in Astronomy from the University of Bonn in 2000. 

Since then I traveled a lot, and I lived in different cities and continents, working as a post-doc in California (2000-2002), in Germany (2003-2006), and in The Netherlands (2007- until present).

I am married, and I have 3 kids, 2 boys (twins), and a girl. They are my life, and together with my job, they are my joy and passion.