Sonia
Massari

italian Gustolab International Food Studies Institute
Dr. Sonia Massari has a PhD in Food Systems and Interaction Design (Engineering Dept, University of Florence). She is the Academic Director of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Food Studies programs in Rome and Director of Gustolab International Institute for Food Systems and Sustainability Studies(she works in parternship with 15 US Universities and she is managing Food Studies Programs in Italy, Vietnam and Japan).She teaches at Scuola Politecnica di Design Milan ( Master in Food Design), at ISIA Design School Rome ( Master in Systemic Design) and at ROMA Tre University. She is currently coordinating the ADI INDEX Food Design commission. She is a scientific consultant and senior researcher for the Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition Foundation and she is a consultant for national TV program on food systems. Her new challenging work: she teaches ” design thinking”  to scientists at  the JRC – The European Commission’s science and knowledge service/hubs ( Ispra and Seville).

In 2012, she won the International “Le Tecnovisionaries” Women Innovation Award, a prize which publicly recognises women who have demonstrated an ability to combine creativity and innovation in order to improve quality of life, in particular in the area of food and nutrition, and in 2014, she won the NAFSA TLS Knowledge Community’s Innovative Research in International Education Award.She is a Board member of the Association for the study of Food and Society (ASFS), she is member of Canadian Association Food and Society (CAFS) and the WE – Women for Empowerment network. She is member of the editorial board of the International Journal of Food Design and Frontiers Journal (on Sustainability). Since 2015, she is involved in the creation of an international platform for Food Design Education (on creating new teaching and learning formats).
She is in the scientific board of the 7th International Conference on Food Studies and in 2015 she founded and directed the first European Conference on “Understanding Food Design”.
She is continuing to work as a consultant for food companies and research institutes.