Biographic data
Alessandra Celletti was born in Rome on 12 February 1962. She mastered with laude in Mathematics at the University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 1984 and, after a fellowship at the “Istituto Nazionale di Alta Matematica” from 1984 to 1986, she obtained the PhD in Mathematics in 1989 at the Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich – ETH, with a thesis under the supervision of Prof. Jürgen Moser on the Kolmogorov-Arnold-Moser (KAM) theory applied to a problem in Celestial Mechanics.
She is currently full professor of Mathematical Physics at the Department of Mathematics – University of Rome Tor Vergata (now on leave after the appointment in ANVUR), where she was previously associate professor during the period 1999-2013. From 1990 to 1999 she was associate researcher at the University of L’Aquila.
During the period 2015-2018 she has been chair of the Department of Mathematics – University of Rome Tor Vergata, from 2001 to 2010 she was member of the Academic Senate of the University of Rome Tor Vergata, from 2010 to 2020 she was the coordinator of a post-graduate course on “Space Science and Technology” at the University of Rome Tor Vergata, from May 2019 to February 2020 she was appointed within the Board of Directors of the Italian Space Agency. She has been member of several PhD schools at the University of Rome Tor Vergata and the University of Roma Tre.
She is founding member of the SIMCA – Italian Society of Celestial Mechanics and Astrodynamics, that she chaired from 2001 to 2013 and of which she was director of the Scientific Committee from 2013 to 2016. She was member of the Scientific Committee of the Italian Mathematical Union from 2015 to 2018 and of the Scientific Council of INdAM-GNFM – National Group of Mathematical Physics from 2013 to 2020. She is chair of the Scientific Committee of Celestial Mechanics of IAU – International Astronomical Union – for the period 2018-2021. She chairs also the commission “Women in Mathematics” of the European Mathematical Society for the period 2017-2020.
Research activity
The research activity of Alessandra Celletti concerns Dynamical Systems and Celestial Mechanics. In particular, she obtained several scientific results about the stability theory of Dynamical Systems and the study of models for the description of problems in Celestial Mechanics. Among such results there are the analysis of models of rotational dynamics, the study of the dynamics of natural and artificial satellites, the analysis of halo and Lissajous orbits around the collinear equilibrium points of the three-body problem. These problems have been investigated through analytical techniques (normal forms, KAM theory, Nekhoroshev theorem, bifurcation theory) and numerical techniques, conjugating the mathematical theories to applied aspects of Celestial Mechanics.
She authored more than one hundred articles on peer-reviewed journals, 2 books for graduate students, 4 popular books, 16 articles on proceedings, 14 chapters of books or encyclopedia items, 10 volumes as editor.
The complete list of publications is available at the web site:
http://www.mat.uniroma2.it/celletti/articoli.html
She participated (also with a coordinator role) at several national and European research projects among which the “Marie Curie Initial Training Networks” named Astronet, Stardust, Stardust-R, as well as projects with the Italian Space Agency and PRIN-MIUR; up to 2020 she coordinated the MIUR Excellence Department Project awarded to the Department of Mathematics, University of Rome Tor Vergata.
International experiences
Since 2010 she is member of the “Celestial Mechanics Institute”, during fall 2018 she has been MSRI member (Mathematical Sciences Research Institute, Berkeley, USA), since 2012 she is member of the International Astronomical Union, since 2012 she is member of the European Mathematical Society, founder corresponding member since 2017 of the Academia Cearense de Matematica in Brazil. She made several research stays abroad, in particular in France and Switzerland.
She has been invited speaker at more than 60 scientific national and international conferences, among which in Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States. She has been member of the scientific or organization committee of about 30 congresses, schools and workshops.
Other activities, prizes and awards
Since 2016, Prof. Alessandra Celletti is Editor-in-Chief of the journal “Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy”, since 2014 she is associate editor of the “Journal of Non-linear Mechanics”, since 2015 she is associate editor of the “Revista Matematica Complutense”, since 2015 she is managing editor of the “Rivista UMI – La Matematica nella Società e nella Cultura”, from 2017 to 2019 she has been associate editor of “Electronic Research Announcements in Mathematical Sciences”, since 2019 she is associate editor of “Mathematics Research Reports”.
She has been invited speaker at the 6th European Congress of Mathematics, Kracow, Poland, in July 2012. She is member of the scientific committee of the European Mathematical Society/European Women in Mathematics. She has done an intense activity of popularization of science; she has been finalist at the “Premio Galileo” for scientific popular books in 2008 and finalist at the “Primo Premio Nazionale di Divulgazione Scientifica” in 2013.
The asteroid 2005 DJ1, n. 117539 bears the name “Alessandra Celletti”.
Evaluation experiences
Prof. Alessandra Celletti has a wide experience in the framework of the research evaluation at national and international level. She has been several times member of competition committees in Mathematical Physics in several Italian universities, and also member of committees for the selection of prizes or invited speakers. She has been member of evaluation committees of national and international projects in France, Germany, Greece, Kazakhstan, Italy, Poland, Czech Republic, Romania, United States. She has been named several times as member of the evaluation panels of projects of the European Commission.
She evaluated candidatures for several international scientific institutions. She is reviewer for many national and international peer review journals.