Director of the Palermo Section: Antonio Paonita

E-mail: antonio.paonita@ingv.it

The Director of the Palermo Section of the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV), Antonio Paonita was appointed by decree n.419 of 25/07/2022 of the General Manager. He is the author of 60 papers in ISI journals, including some reviews in international journals and frontier articles in journals with a very high impact factor. He has developed innovative approaches and methodologies for estimates of magmatic outgassing pressures, overpressures in magmatic reservoirs, geothermo-barometrics in volcanic and hydrothermal systems, estimates of magma ascent rate, estimates of abundances of volatiles in the MORB mantle on a planetary scale, models of Self-organized criticality in magmatic systems.

He conceived, designed and implemented the “Laser Ablation” laboratory at the Palermo INGV Section for the chemical microanalysis of dissolved and/or trapped volatiles in solid matrices, and of trace elements in melt inclusions with LA-ICPMS technique, developing a research line based on the integration of the geochemistry of solids and fluids. This infrastructure has also made it possible to move towards archaeology and the environment. He has received awards and recognitions from the scientific community for his research activity.

He is editor of international specialized journals and special volumes, evaluator of projects and reviewer of scientific works for various national and international bodies and publishers. He is a session organizer and member of scientific committees of conferences and congresses. He has tutored degree and doctoral theses at Italian and foreign universities.

He is a manager of national research projects and participates in numerous international projects, and has held various institutional roles within INGV. Among these, as Head of the Functional Unit, he managed for several years the monitoring activities of the Palermo Section, with special regard to the activities related to Annex A of the Convention between the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology and the National Department of Civil Protection.

He has managed several volcanic crises on Italian volcanoes, being a member of the INGV Crisis Unit for eruptive and volcanic activities, and INGV referent in meetings of the Large Risks Commission.