Born in Genoa (Italy) on June 27th 1956. Master in physics at the University of Genoa on Dec 1981. PhD studies at the Forschungsanlage Juelich (Germany). Doctor Rerum Naturae at the Technische Hochschule of Aachen (Germany) in June 1985. Since March 1984 he is Research staff member and since November 2001 Full Professor in Condensed Matter Physics at the Department of Physics of the University of Genoa (Italy). His research interest is in experimental surface physics and nanoscience with emphasis on gas surface interaction, simple chemical reactions, surface plasmons and ultrathin films and has been performed in collaboration with CNR-IMEM. Since 2001 he has been responsible for the Erasmus student exchange programme for physics of the University of Genoa and since 2008 for the Erasmus Mundus International Master Serp+ (www.master-serp.eu) in Material Science and for the International Summer School on Science Management (www.sosmse.eu). From 2002 to 2005 he has been the Deputy Director of the Department of Physics of the University of Genoa. He chaired the conferences Vibrations at Surfaces, European Conference on Surface Science (http://www.fisica.unige.it/ecoss/) and International conference on solid films and surfaces (http://icsfs16.fisica.unige.it/). He has served in the advisory boards of the main conferences in his field. He has published about 185 papers in international scientific journals, (about 20 with impact factor larger than 7, one paper in Nature). His H-index is 34 according to ISI and Scopus. His scientific results were presented in 37 invited talks at international conferences and about 70 invited seminars at universities and research laboratories. He is secretary of the Surface Science Division of IUVSTA and member of the scientific board of the Union of Scientists for Disarmament. The more detailed curriculum vitae can be downloaded from the web page http://www.fisica.unige.it/~rocca