Paola Palozza, a senior scientist at the Institute of General Pathology of the Catholic University in Rome (Italy) died on May 21st at the age of 53 in Rome, after a long combat with disease. Paola is survived by her daughter, her husband, two sisters and her mother.
Paola graduated in Medicine and obtained a PhD in Oncology, at the Catholic University of Rome. Her collaboration with Norman Krinsky at the Department of Biochemistry of Tufts University (Boston, MA) between 1989 and 1991 resulted in an important series of studies on Astaxanthin, Canthaxanthin, beta-Carotene and alpha-tocopherol. During her subsequent foreign collaboration at Institut für Biochemie und Molekularbiologie, University of Bern, in Switzerland she gave an important contribution to the understanding of the regulatory functions of d-alpha-Tocopherol by studying its inhibition of vascular smooth muscle cells proliferation and protein kinase C activity. As an independent scientist at the Catholic University of Rome she continued a very successful scientific career with studies on the redox properties of carotenoids and their role in the modulation of intracellular oxidative status and tumor growth. She also studied the antitumor and antioxidant activity of natural (vitamin E, polyphenols) and synthetic molecules (derivatives of lycopene, vitamin C and vitamin E). Finally she gave interesting contributions to the field of omega n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and their role in the regulation of cell growth and angiogenesis.
Besides her scientific merits, one cannot speak of Paola without remembering her way of approaching scientific research with immense passion, almost in a romantic fashion. Paola was undoubtedly also a woman of deep culture and a passionate reader: her bookshelves, crammed with books arranged in triple rows, were bent by the weight of the volumes. She collected fairy tales and had a passion for Angels' literature. In her vision of a world, where only important issues matter, she took her long illness in the unconventional way of an intellectual experience. She was considered as a sage person, one of the few around with whom it might have been interesting and stimulating to take a long journey to far away destinations. Paola beyond science took time, energy and attention for her daughter and her beloved husband. She will be remembered for her smile and her extraordinary optimism and as a nonconformist woman provided with great generosity and humanity.