Alessandra Zambonelli is full professor in Botany at the Bologna University (Italy). She has been working on truffle biology and cultivation since 1992. She was a member of the Tuber genome consortium - established in 2005 for genome sequencing of the Tuber melanosporum and participates at the project 1kFG: Deep Sequencing of Ecologically relevant Dikaria. She was member of the scientific and or/organizing committee of several national and international conferences. She is the President of the European Confederation of Mediterranean Mycology (CEMM) and of the Italian Mycological Society Unione Micologica Italiana (UMI) and an honorary member of the New Zealand Truffle Association. She is member of the OPTIMA (Organization for the Phyto-Taxonomic Investigation in the Mediterranean Area) and of the Italian “National Agricultural Academy”. She has contributed to 213 scientific articles published in international and Italian journals, books or proceedings with more than 100 of these on truffles. She is co-Author of three Italian books on truffles and of the book in English: “Taming the Truffle: The History, Lore, and Science of the Ultimate Mushroom” of Timber press. She was co-editor of two Springer books of Soil series: “Edible Ectomycorrhizal Mushrooms Current Knowledge and Future Prospects” and “True Truffle (Tuber spp.) in the World: Soil Ecology, Systematics and Biochemistry”. She was referee of numerous scientific journals.

Fungal ecology, biology and genetics, Mycorrhizal fungi, Truffle biology, taxonomy and cultivation