**Valeria Cavallaro**

Valeria Cavallaro has been a full-time researcher of the Italian National Research Council (CNR) since 1st April, 1986. Her areas of expertise are the influence of abiotic stress (salinity, drought) and seed pre-treatments (scarification, osmopriming, etc.) on the seed germination of different Mediterranean species (tomato, Cynara spp, forage grasses, carob, etc.); biotechnology in the rapid propagation and regeneration of improved varieties (micropropagation of globe artichoke, biomass species, carob, etc.); and the use of arbuscolar mychorrhizal inoculum to improve the acclimatisation process of micropropagated plants and the tolerance to nutritional and abiotic stresses.

She taught "Plant Genetics" and "Field crops" for the Agricultural Sciences Faculty of Catania University. She has participated in national and international projects and organized diverse training courses on micropropagation and sustainable agriculture for students and high school teachers. She is the author of one book, several book chapters, and 50 articles published in national and international peer-reviewed journals.
