Prof Ardizzoni has received his medical degree and completed a postgraduate course in internal medicine and medical oncology at the University of Genoa, Italy. He was Deputy Head of Medical Oncology and Chairman of the Lung Cancer Program at National Institute for Cancer Research of Genoa until 2003. From 2004 to 2014 he was Head of Medical Oncology at the University Hospital in Parma, Italy and since July 2014 has been appointed as Head of Medical Oncology at University Hospital S.Orsola-Malpighi in Bologna, Italy. Prof Ardizzoni has been Professor of  Oncology at the University of Genoa and Contract Professor of Oncology at the University of Parma and Bologna and is now Full Professor of Medical Oncology at the University of Bologna. He has published over 300 papers in international peer-reviewed journals indexed by PubMed. Prof Ardizzoni has served as Secretary and  Quality Assurance Chairman of the EORTC Lung Cancer Group and as Secretary of the Italian Task Force for Lung Cancer (FONICAP). He is also a member of ESMO and IASLC Educational Committees and GOIRC Cooperative Research Group. Prof Ardizzoni has served as coordinator of several clinical and translational studies, mainly in the area of lung cancer and mesothelioma treatment, at national and international level and has conducted clinical research according to GCP as PI of more than 100 clinical trials. He has also received a number of academic research grants from the Italian Ministry of Health, the Italian Drug Agency and AIRC (Italian Association for Cancer Research).