Vita: Renato Guiseppe Mazzolini
was born in Milan (1945). With a degree in Philosophy from Milan State University (1970), he specialised in the history of science at the Domus Galilaeana in Pisa (1971 – 74) and obtained his Dr. Phil. Hist. from Bern University (1979). In 1981 he was awarded the Henry E. Sigerist Prize. He has been Wellcome Research Fellow at Oxford University (three years), Fellow of the Humboldt-Stiftung at Göttingen (22 months) and Fellow of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington (one year). Since 1990 Mazzolini is Professor of the History of Science at the Faculty of Sociology of Trento University. Specialised in the history of physiology, microscopy and physical anthropology for the period 1640 – 1850 he has published a considerable number of contributions in these research areas. The italian historian has also edited the unpublished correspondence of several physiologists and natural historians of the 18th and early 19th century. In the last ten years Mazzolini has directed several projects financed by the CNR and the MURST concerning science in the public sphere.