Our biggest stories in 2023

Sardinia’s push to host the next big gravitational wave detector

This was the year when Italy’s bid to host the Einstein Telescope (ET), the next-generation gravitational waves detector, really took off. The underground area near the decommissioned Sos Enattos mine in Lula is one of the two candidate sites to host the interferometer, and is competing with the Meuse–Rhine Euroregion (EMR), at the border of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany. Revisit our story from February, when the government had just appointed a scientific advisory board chaired by the Nobel Prize-winner, Giorgio Parisi, to promote the bid.

New computing centre to power up Italian scientists and companies

Five new national research centers were launched during 2023 with funding from the European Union’s recovery plan. This feature about a country-wide infrastructure that will provide computing services to research centers and businesses, was the first in a series of articles where we cover each of the five centers. You can also read about the centres on sustainable mobility, biodiversity, innovative therapies. The fifth chapter, on a center for agriculture and food technology, will be online in January.

Scientists protest Italy’s ban on cultivated meat

In April, the Italian government approved the first draft of a bill banning the production and commercialization of cultivated meat for human and animal consumption. Cultivated meat is obtained by taking fat and muscle cells from live animals and making them grow and differentiate in a nutrient broth in a bioreactor, and is seen as a promising tool to reduce the environmental impacts of conventional meat production and improve food security and safety. The bill was later approved by the Parliament and became law in November. Scientists have been fighting the ban, which they say will have a negative impact on research and innovation in Italy.

Mysterious disappearance of the Italian ‘ERC’ grants

Upon its launch in 2021, the ‘Italian Science Fund’ was welcomed with high expectations, as the first public funding programme for individual research projects in Italy. But 18 months later, applicants were still waiting, and enthusiasm gave way to disappointment. Revisit our story on what went wrong, and how the delay was affecting Italian scientists.

Italy’s new seismic hazard map is back to square one

Eight years have passed since scientists started working on a new official map of Italy’ seismic hazard. In such an earthquake-prone country, a state-of-the art seismic map is a crucial tool for risk prevention. But a series of disagreements between the scientists and government officials involved has slowed the process, which came to a halt this spring when a review panel appointed by the National Institute for Geophysics and Volcanology rejected the updated map.

Italian cities need to plan for longer and more frequent heatwaves

During the severe heatwave that hit Italy in July and August 2023, we talked to climatologists to understand how they expect the country’s climate to evolve in the next decades, and how Italian cities can learn to mitigate extreme events. Rome could have 28 heatwave days on average in 2080 if greenhouse emissions peak around mid-century, and 54 if they continue to grow, doubling by the end of the century. Milan will see a similar trend, with 30 heatwave days if climate mitigation policies are adopted and 60 if not.

What scientists know about the blue crab invasion

This summer Callinectes Sapidus, a blue crab species native to the east coast of the United States, invaded the northern Adriatic Sea, threatening the clam farming industry of the Po River delta in the Veneto and Emilia-Romagna regions. Can the invasive species be stopped? Researchers are working with regional authorities and fishers’ associations to develop a management strategy, but promoting the consumption of blue crabs and turn them into an economic asset could be the best option.

Italian nuclear industry revival on the table

In September the Italian government announced its plans to reintroduce nuclear power in the country. The country’s nuclear programme started in the 1960s and came to a swifthalt at the end of the 1980s, after the explosion of the Chernobyl reactor in the Soviet Union. In 1987, Italians voted overwhelmingly in a referendum against further nuclear development. While some experts think nuclear energy is necessary to meet the proportion of demand that cannot depend on renewable sources, others doubt that Italy could have new reactors in place before 20 years – too late for contributing to decarbonization.

Rescue of an orphan drug points to a new model for therapies for rare diseases

In a world-first for a non-profit, the Italian Telethon Foundation decided to take over the licence to produce and distribute Strimvelis, a gene therapy product that is the only available cure for a rare condition called ADA-SCID, and that the biopharma company Orchard Therapeutics had discontinued in 2022. Scientists and charities will be watching to see whether this new business model may rescue other innovative therapies.

Weighing the risk at Campi Flegrei

Earthquakes have been rattling the Campi Flegrei caldera near Naples for a good part of 2023, culminating in a 4.3 magnitude shock on 27 September — the region’s strongest in 40 years. The seismic sequence has revived fears of an eruption, but is also providing scientists with more data to study the origin of ground displacement at Campi Flegrei, a phenomenon called bradyseism.