Walter Randazzo focused his career on understanding how to prevent and control foodborne pathogens with the final goal of protecting public health by developing and evaluating novel strategies, technologies and processes. His research career is defined by a wide international mobility which contributed to gain a solid scientific background and transversal skills related to food microbiology, food technology and biotechnology. Dr. Randazzo holds a BSc, MSc in Agricultural Science and Food Technology (2009; 2012), and an International PhD in Agricultural Microbiology from the University of Palermo (Italy) (2015). He developed his research at UCC (Ireland), UPV (Spain), University of Valencia (Spain), Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (GA, USA), and IATA-CSIC (Spain) focusing on foodborne bacterial and viral pathogens. He has greatly contributed to develop methods for viral detection in food and environment, using advanced molecular (RT-qPCR, viability RT-qPCR) and cell culture techniques (3D human intestinal enteroids culture) to assess their infectivity. During 2020-22, he supported the SARS-CoV-2 wastewater-based epidemiology program at Dr. Sánchez’s lab (VISAFElab, IATA-CSIC) validating a standard operating procedure for SARS-CoV-2 RNA detection implemented nationwide. Since Dec 2023, he is Científico Titular of Research of the National Research Council (CSIC) at the Institute of Agrochemistry and Food Technology (IATA-CSIC). Dr. Randazzo has published more than 55 (WoS) scientific papers,resulting in an h-index of 27 (WoS) with more than 2670 citations (Scopus). He contributed to 3 book chapters, and presented more than 60 communications in congresses. He regularly contributes in editorial activities as reviewer for a range of top journals, and he is an external project evaluator for several agencies. He has mentored Ph.D. students, BSc, MSc, and several visiting students. Dr. Randazzo is member of specialized scientific societies (e.g., World Society for Virology, International Society of Food and Environmental Virology, European Virus Bioinformatics Center) and engaged in several dissemination activities. Dr. Randazzo's research priorities focus on microbiological food safety willing to couple well-stablished methods with novel strategies to prevent foodborne illness.
