Newcastle University

Qualifications

2008 Ph.D in “Functional Neuroimaging: from cells to systems” at the Institute for Advanced Biomedical Technologies (ITAB), University of Chieti, Italy (with honors).
2004 Master in "Bank, Insurance and Finance Management". Faculty of Economics of the University of Rome "La Sapienza", Italy.
2001 Computer Science Degree. Faculty of Science, Mathematics, Physics and Natural of the University of Rome "La Sapienza”, Italy.

Previous Positions

2011-2012 Honorary Research Fellow at School of Psychology, Birmingham University, Birmingham, UK.   

2008-2010 Research Fellow at School of Psychology, Birmingham University, Birmingham, UK.   

2008 Research Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Biomedical Technologies (ITAB), University of Chieti, Italy.

2008 Ph.D in “Functional Neuroimaging: from cells to systems” at the Institute for Advanced Biomedical Technologies (ITAB), University of Chieti, Italy (with honours).

2006-2007 Visiting Research Fellow, Aston University, Birmingham UK.

2001-2007 Research Fellow AFaR- ISTC-CNR

Memberships

2011       Member of British Neuroscience Association (BNA)
2009-12  Member of Organization for Human Brain Mapping (OHBM)
2010       Member of Italian Society for Clinic Neurophysiology (SINC)
2009       Member of Italian Association of Psychology (AIP)

Honours and Awards

2010 Best Poster at ICCN 2010 28 October - 1 November, Kobe, Japan.

2010 International Federation Of Clinical Neurophysiology (IFCN) - Fellowship to attend the International Congress of Clinical Neurophysiology -ICCN2010Award –
2008 Research Award – AFaR (Association for research Fatebenefratelli)

Research Interests

Neural source identification from electrophysiological non-invasive recordings; MEG-EEG/fMRI Integration; Logical Reasoning and Neuroscience; Functional Connectivity by MultiVariate AutoRegressive Model (MVAR); Fetal Magnetocardiography and Fetal Magnetoencephalography;

Esteem Indicators

Editorial Board Activity

2012-present      Journal of Computational Medicine.

2012-present     Scientifica (Neuroscience section).

2011-2015         World Journal of Translational Medicine. 

2011-2015         World Journal of Neurology. 

2010-present     Journal of Signal and Information Processing.        

Funding

Funding Awards (As a Principal Investigator):

2010       International Joint Project 2010/R1 - Royal Society Travel Grant. ‘The key movement controllers: an EEG/fMRI study of the hand network dynamics’ £12000.

2010      Cutting Edge ‘Developing a Protocol for Analyzing EEG Data from Speech Production Studies’. Birmingham University, Birmingham UK. £7454

2010      FIS/07 ‘The neural basis of human fluid intelligence: application of advanced methods for fMRI-EEG integration’. Chieti University, Chieti, Italy. €12000.

Funding Award (as External Collaborator):

2011       Supported by FISM - Fondazione Italiana Sclerosi Multipla (€30000), Research Grant ‘Fatigue Relief in Multiple Sclerosis by Neuromodulation: a transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) Intervention’. [FaMuSNe].

2010       Supported by FISM - Fondazione Italiana Sclerosi Multipla – 2010 ‘Fatigue Relief in Multiple Sclerosis by Neuromodulation: a transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) Intervention’. [FaMuSNe]. €30000

2009       Supported by FISM - Fondazione Italiana Sclerosi Multipla – 2009 Cod.2009/R/23 'Fatigue in Multiple Sclerosis: is there a neuroanatomic and functional profile?’[FaMuS]. €60000.

Funding Awards (as Co-Investigator):

2006-2008 Ministry of University and Research (MIUR), Projects of Relevant National Interest (PRIN), ‘Reorganization of the sensory and motor cortices in selective lesions of the I and II motor neuron, motor neuropathies, sensory neuropathies and myopathies. Integrated study on neurophysiology and neuroimaging.’ [2005063547].

2006-2008 Ministry of University and Research (MIUR), Projects of Relevant National Interest (PRIN), ‘Multimodal integration of structural and functional imaging for the study of cerebral connectivity’. [2005027850].

2006             European Space Agency (ESA-ARIADNA), ‘Non invasive brain-machine interfaces’ (AO/1-4919/05/NL/HE, study id 05/6402).

2001-2003    Ministry of Health-IRCCS Fondazione Istituto Neurologico C. Mondino, Research grant ‘Central and pheripheral mechanism of muscle fatigue: physiological and pathological features’. [B06].

• Tomasevic L, Zito G, Pasqualetti P, Filippi M, Landi D, Ghazaryan A, Lupoi D, Porcaro C, Bagnato F, Rossini P, Tecchio F. Cortico-muscular coherence as an index of fatigue in multiple sclerosis. Multiple Sclerosis 2013, 19(371), 334-343.
• Cottone C, Tomasevic L, Porcaro C, Filligoi G, Tecchio F. Physiological aging impacts the hemispheric balances of resting state primary somatosensory activities. Brain Topography 2013, 26(1), 186-199.
• DiPino G, Porcaro C, Tombini M, Assenza G, Pellegrino G, Tecchio F, Rossini PM. A neurally-interfaced hand prosthesis tuned inter-hemispheric communication. Restorative Neurology and Neuroscience 2012, 30(5), 407-418.
• Tombini M, Rigosa J, Zappasodi F, Porcaro C, Citi L, Carpaneto J, Rossini PM, Micera S. Combined analysis of cortical (EEG) and nerve stump signals improves robotic hand control. Neurorehabilitation and Neural Repair 2012, 26(3), 275-281.
• Ostwald D, Porcaro C, Mayhew SD, Bagshaw AP. EEG-fMRI based information theoretic characterization of the human perceptual decision system. PLoS One 2012, 7(4), e33896.
• Lei X, Ostwald D, Hu JH, Qiu C, Porcaro C, Bagshaw AP, Yao DZ. Multimodal Functional Network Connectivity: An EEG-fMRI Fusion in Network Space. PLoS One 2011, 6(9), e24642.
• Porcaro C, Ostwald D, Hadjipapas A, Barnes GR, Bagshaw AP. The relationship between the visual evoked potential and the gamma band investigated by blind and semi-blind methods. NeuroImage 2011, 56(3), 1059-1071.
• Ostwald D, Porcaro C, Bagshaw AP. Voxel-wise information theoretic EEG-fMRI feature integration. NeuroImage 2011, 55(3), 1270-1286.
• Ostwald D, Porcaro C, Bagshaw AP. An information theoretic approach to EEG-fMRI integration of visually evoked responses. NeuroImage 2010, 49(1), 498-516.
• Porcaro C, Ostwald D, Bagshaw AP. Functional source separation improves the quality of single trial visual evoked potentials recorded during concurrent EEG-fMRI. NeuroImage 2010, 50(1), 112-23.
• Porcaro C, Zappasodi F, Rossini PM, Tecchio F. Choice of multivariate autoregressive model order affecting real network functional connectivity estimate. Clin Neurophysiol 2009, 120(2), 436-448.
• Medaglia MT, Tecchio F, Seri S, Di Lorenzo G, Rossini PM, Porcaro C. Contradiction in universal and particular reasoning. Human Brain Mapping 2009, 30(12), 4187-4197.
• Porcaro C, Coppola G, Di Lorenzo G, Zappasodi F, Siracusano A, Pierelli F, Rossini PM, Tecchio F, Seri S. Hand somatosensory subcortical and cortical sources assessed by functional source separation: an EEG study. Human Brain Mapping 2009, 30(2), 660-674.
• Barbati G, Porcaro C, Hadjipapas A, Adjamian P, Pizzella V, Romani GL, Seri S, Tecchio F, Barnes GR. Functional source separation applied to induced visual gamma activity. Human Brain Mapping 2008, 29(2), 131-41.
• Porcaro C, Barbati G, Zappasodi F, Rossini PM, Tecchio F. Hand sensory-motor cortical network assessed by functional source separation. Human Brain Mapping 2008, 29(1), 70-81.
• Tecchio F, Zappasodi F, Porcaro C, Barbati G, Assenza G, Salustri C, Rossini PM. High-gamma band activity of primary hand cortical areas: a sensorimotor feedback efficiency index. NeuroImage 2008, 40(1), 256-264.
• Tecchio F, Melgari JM, Zappasodi F, Porcaro C, Milazzo D, Cassetta E, Rossini PM. Sensorimotor integration in focal task-specific hand dystonia: a magnetoencephalographic assessment. Neuroscience 2008, 154(2), 563-571.
• Tecchio F, Porcaro C, Barbati G, Zappasodi F. Functional source separation and hand cortical representation for a brain-computer interface feature extraction. Journal of Physiology 2007, 580(3), 703-721.
• Tecchio F, Zappasodi F, Melgari JM, Porcaro C, Cassetta E, Rossini PM. Sensory-motor interaction in primary hand cortical areas: a magnetoencephalography assessment. Neuroscience 2007, 141(1), 533-542.
• Tecchio F, Graziadio S, Barbati G, Sigismondi R, Zappasodi F, Porcaro C, Valente G, Balsi M, Rossini PM. Somatosensory dynamic gamma-band synchrony: A neural code of sensorimotor dexterity. NeuroImage 2007, 35(1), 185-193.
• Tecchio F, Porcaro C, Zappasodi F, Pesenti A, Ercolani M, Rossini PM. Cortical short-term fatigue effects assessed via rhythmic brain-muscle coherence. Experimental Brain Research 2006, 174(1), 144-151.
• Porcaro C, Zappasodi F, Barbati G, Salustri C, Pizzella V, Rossini PM, Tecchio F. Fetal auditory responses to external sounds and mother's heart beat: detection improved by Independent Component Analysis. Brain Res 2006, 1101(1), 51-58.
• Barbati G, Sigismondi R, Zappasodi F, Porcaro C, Graziadio S, Valente G, Balsi M, Rossini PM, Tecchio F. Functional source separation from magnetoencephalographic signals. Human Brain Mapping 2006, 27(12), 925-34.
• Salustri C, Barbati G, Porcaro C. Fetal magnetocardiographic signals extracted by 'signal subspace' blind source separation. IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering 2005, 52(6), 1140-1142.
• Barbati G, Porcaro C, Zappasodi F, Rossini PM, Tecchio F. Optimization of an independent component analysis approach for artifact identification and removal in magnetoencephalographic signals. Clinical Neurophysiology 2004, 115(5), 1220-1232.