Dr. Federico Boem

Office hours

by arrangement

Vita

AREAS OF SPECIALIZATION
Philosophy of the Life Sciences and Biomedicine, Philosophy of
Scientific Practice, Metascience

AREAS OF COMPETENCE
Philosophy of Science, Logic, Bioethics, Epistemology,
History of Science, STS
 

EMPLOYMENT

• 2024 - current - Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB)
  Researcher
  Institute for Philosophy I; Lehrstuhl Prof. Dr. Helmut Pulte
  Wissenschaftstheorie und Wissenschaftsgeschichte
   
• 2021 - 2024 - University of Twente
  Researcher / Philosophy Section
   
• 2020 - 2021 - University of Florence
  Researcher / Department of Literature and Philosophy
   
• 2019 - 2020 - University of Turin
  Postdoc / Department of Philosophy and Education
   
• 2018 - 2019 - Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU)
  Visiting Fellow MCMP
   
• 2018 - King’s College London / Department of Philosophy
  Visiting Lecturer of Ethics and Politics of Science and
  Technology
   
• 2016 - 2020 - University of Milan / Department of Oncology and Haemato-Oncology / Adjunct Lecturer
   
• 2019 - 2021 - University of Verona / School of Medicine and Surgery / Adjunct Lecturer

EDUCATION

• 2015 - European School of Molecular Medicine / University of Milan; PhD in Foundations of the Life Sciences and Their Ethical Consequences;  Committee: Federica Russo, Thomas Vaccari
  Dissertation: “A Matter of Style. How Map-Thinking and Bio-ontologies shape contemporary Molecular Research”.
   
• 2011 - University of Exeter / MA in History and Philosophy of Biology; Thesis chair: Sabina Leonelli
  MA thesis: “The Relationship between Biological Collections and Experimental Dimension in the Practice and Epistemology of 20th Century Biology”.
   
• 2010 - University of Florence / Laurea in Logic and Philosophy of Science; Committee: Marcello Buiatti, Elena Castellani
  Thesis: “Ascesa e caduta del Dogma Centrale della Biologia Molecolare”. (tr. The Rise and Fall of Central Dogma of Molecular Biology).

Further Information

Federico Boem received his PhD (with highest grade) in 2016 from the European School of Molecular Medicine and the State University of Milan. He is currently working as a postdoctoral researcher at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum. His research interests include the philosophy of biology and biomedicine (including technological and methodological aspects), the epistemology of biological knowledge, the relationship between science and democracy and the philosophy of scientific communication.

Previously, Federico Boem worked at the University of Twente (NL), as part of the European project ERC-Syn-2020 (a.k.a. ‘NanoBubbles’), which aims to provide new insights into how, when and why science fails. In addition, he held research positions at the Department of Humanities and Philosophy of the University of Florence (Italy), on a project concerning theepistemology of scientific communication. The project was dedicated to examining the interactions between clinical and experimental communication with the general public, at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Federico Boem also regularly collaborates with Amedei's laboratory on new conceptual tools addressing host-microbiota interactions and its implications for personalised medicine and operational definitions of health and disease (also with a focus on defining a pathogen from a systemic/ecological perspective).

Previously, he was a post-doc in Professor Jan Sprenger's group, where he developed research on the analysis of the struggle for objective scientific claims when the public sphere is involved (as in the case of vaccine hesitation).

Earlier, his research was devoted to analysing the impact of computational biology on contemporary biomedical research. In particular, Federico Boem studied the rise of computational classificatory tools, such as bio-ontologies, in the current biomedical context. He analysed the reasons for this success, including the limitations and possible future directions. Federico Boem framed his analysis by considering the shift from pure bench research to bioinformatics and he attempted to examine this shift by adopting different epistemic categories such as models, paradigms and styles of reasoning. Rather, it should be seen as a radical change in the way research is done and in the way scientific facts become such. His work was made possible thanks to the involvement in scientific work at the IEO (European Institute of Oncology in Milan (Italy) and thanks to the time visiting the EBI (European Bioinformatics Institute) in Hinxton (UK).

During his training and in addition to his philosophical work, he did several laboratory rotations to get accustomed to molecular experimental practice and to learn the use of computational resources.

Publications (selection) 

PEER-REVIEWED JOURNALS

2024

• Lamminpää I, Boem F, Amedei A, Pro-health worms? Prospects and pitfalls of helminth therapy, BioEssays, (forthcoming).
   
• Rost Videla NC, Said M, Gharib M, Lévy R, Boem F. Better nanoscience through open, collaborative, and critical discussions. Materials Horizons.
   
• Boem, F., & Suárez, J. Epistemic misalignments in microbiome research. BioEssays, Article 2300220.

2023

• Boem, F., Greslehner, G. P., Chiu, L., & Konsman, J-P. Minding the gut: extending embodied cognition and perception to the gut complex, Frontiers of Neuroscience, Volume 17:1172783.
   
• Boem, F., & Paiusco, E. A philosophical outing to Dutch Design Week. Journal of Human-Technology Relations, 1.
   
• Boem, F., Bonzio, S., Osimani, B., & Sacco, A. The Cochrane Case: An Epistemic Analysis on Decision-Making and Trust in Science in the Age of Information. Foundations of science, 28(1), 143-158.

2022

• Suárez, J, Boem, F., Technology-driven surrogates and the perils of epistemic misalignment: an analysis in contemporary microbiome science. Synthese 200(6), 1-28.
   
• Boem, F., Racism After the End of the Race: A Brief Epistemological Viewpoint on Genomic Studies and Racism. Africa e Mediterraneo, 96(1/22).
   
• Boem, F., Bonzio S., A Logic for a Critical Attitude? Logic and Logical Philosophy, Volume 31, no.2.

2021

• Boem, F., Galletti, M., Public Health Policies, Science, and Democracy. Philosophy Moves Beyond the Pandemic. HUMANA.MENTE Journal of Philosophical Studies, 14(40), III-V.
   
• Boem, F., Ratti, E., Science and Politics in a Time of Pandemic: Some Epistemological and Political Lessons from the Italian Story. HUMANA.MENTE Journal of Philosophical Studies, 14(40), 89-124.
   
• Boem, F., La mente estesa ma individuata: Una prospettiva simbiotica, Rivista Internazionale di Filosofia e Psicologia. 12, 3, p. 254-270.
   
• Boem, F., Modelling Pandemic: Proximate and Ultimate Causes, Argumenta. 6, 2, p. 57-77.
   
• Boem, F., Nannini, G. & Amedei, Multidisciplinary of anti-COVID-19 battle: from immunological weapons to ecological interventions, Frontiers in Bioscience-Landmark, 26(11); 1274-1285.
   
• Boem, F., Ferretti, G. & Caiani, S., Out of our skull, in our skin: the Microbiota-Gut-Brain axis and the Extended Cognition Thesis, Biology & Philosophy 36, 14.

2020

• Boem, F., Scientific Protocols as Recipes: A New Way to Look at Experimental Practice in the Life Sciences and the Hidden Philosophy Within, HUMANA.MENTE Journal of Philosophical Studies, 13(38), 281-299.
   
• Ronai, I., Greslehner, G. P., Boem, F. et al., "Microbiota, symbiosis and individuality summer school meeting report". Microbiome 8, 117.
   
• Boem, F., Nannini, G. & Amedei, Not just ‘immunity’: how the microbiota can reshape our approach to cancer immunotherapy, Immunotherapy.
   
• Niccolai, E., Boem, F., Emmi, G. & Amedei, A., The link "Cancer and autoimmune diseases" in the light of microbiota: evidence of a potential culprit, Immunology Letters 222.

2019

• Boem, F.,  Amedei A., Healthy axis: Towards an integrated view of the gut-brain health. World Journal of Gastroenterology, 25(29):3838-3841.
   
• Niccolai, E., Boem, F., Russo, E. & Amedei, A., The Gut–Brain Axis in the Neuropsychological Disease Model of Obesity: A Classical Movie Revised by the Emerging Director “Microbiome”. Nutrients 2019, 11, 156.

2018

• Amedei, A. & Boem, F., I’ve Gut A Feeling: Microbiota Impacting the Conceptual and Experimental Perspectives of Personalized Medicine. Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2018, 19, 3756.

2017

• Boniolo, G., Andreoletti, M., Boem, F., Ratti, E., The Main Faces of Robustness. Dialogue and Universalism, 3, 157-172.

2016

• Boem, F., Orienteering Tools: Biomedical Research with Ontologies. HUMANA.MENTE Journal of Philosophical Studies, 9(30), 37-65.
   
• Boem, F., Ratti, E., Andreoletti, M. & Boniolo, G., Why genes are like lemons. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences.

2015

• DiFrisco, J., Pontarotti, G., Boem, F., Schlaepfer, G., Sokolowska, E. & Fernández-Labandera, E., Ontological Issues in the Life Sciences. Biological Theory.

2014

• Germain, P-L., Ratti, E. & Boem, F., Junk or Functional DNA? ENCODE and the Function Controversy. Biology & Philosophy.

2012

• Boem, F., Camara, G., Chuk, E., Quattri, F.,  Ratti, E., Sanfilippo, E M., Sojic, A., Diverse perspectives on ontology: A joint report on the First IAOA Interdisciplinary Summer School on Ontological Analysis. Applied ontology 8 (1):59-71.

OTHER PEER REVIEW PUBLICATIONS

Volume contributions:
 
2023

• Greslehner, G. P., Boem, F., Chiu, L., & Konsman, J-P., Philosophical Perspectives on Neuroendocrine–Immune Interactions: The Building Block Model and Complementary Neuro-Endocrine-Immune-Microbiota Systems Approaches. In J. P. Konsman, & T. M. Reyes (Eds.), Neuroendocrine-Immune System Interactions (pp. 31-61). (Masterclass in Neuroendocrinology; Vol. 13). Springer Nature.

2022

• Russo, E., Boem, F., Curini, L., & Amedei, A., Gastrointestinal Cancers: What Is the Real Board of Microenvironment and the Role of Microbiota–Immunity Axis?, Interdisciplinary Cancer Research Springer.

2021

• Russo, E., Boem, F. & Amedei, A., Role of microbiome in cancer immunotherapy. Cancer Immunology and Immunotherapy 1st Edition Volume 1: Delivery Strategies and Engineering Technologies in Cancer Immunotherapy (edited by Mansoor M. Amiji and Lara Scheherazade Milane).

2020

• Boem, F., Malagrinò, I. & Bertolaso, M., In Silico Clinical Trials: a Possible Response to Complexity in Pharmacology, in Uncertainty in Pharmacology: Epistemology, Methods, and Decisions. LaCaze, A. & Osimani, B. (eds.). Cham: Springer, p. 135-152 18 p. (Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science; vol. 338).

2016

• Boem, F., Ratti, E., Towards a Notion of Intervention in Big-Data Biology and Molecular Medicine, in Philosophy of Molecular Medicine: Foundational Issues in Research and Practice  (Edited by Giovanni Boniolo and Marco J Nathan), Routledge.

2015

• Boem, F, Boniolo, G., Pavelka Z., Stratification and Biomedicine: How Philosophy Stems from Medicine and Biotechnology in The Future of Scientific Practice (edited by Marta Bertolaso), Pickering & Chatto, (2015).

BOOKS:

2023

• Boem, F., Pensare per mappe. Ontologie per una pratica scientifica. Mimesis Edizioni.

2021

• Boem, F., Forme dell'argomentare e del ragionare. Mondadori Education - Le Monnier Università.
   

EDITING:  

2012

• Elementi per una genetica forense, (co-edited with Luca Marelli), Mondadori.