Serena Benatti is Staff Researcher at the INAF – Astronomical Observatory of Palermo.
She obtained her PhD in 2011 at CISAS (Padova University).
Since 2013 she is involved in the GAPS activities, working in the search and characterisation of exoplanets with the radial velocity technique.
In the framework of the second GAPS Large Programme, she managed the Young Objects sub-program, dedicated to the search, confirmation and mass determination of planets orbiting around young stars (age < 800 Myr).
Serena is currently leading the Ariel Masses Survey (ArMS) Large Programme which is part of the third GAPS “evolution”.
The main goal of the program is to provide robust planetary mass measurements for planets with radii within the Radius Valley. This result will support future atmospheric characterisation of those planets, in particular in the framework of the ESA-Ariel Mission.
Serena is highly involved in the preparation of Ariel, and besides the effort in the mass determination of the future targets, she is also leading two sub-WG dedicated to the stellar activity characterisation of the planet hosts and is the reference person for the Ariel Communication and Public Engagement in Italy.
She participates in the preparation of the ESA-PLATO Mission (focusing on the known planet hosts in the PLATO Input Catalog) and she is a member of the ESPRESSO@VLT GTO Consortium.
In 2015/16, Serena was involved in the realisation of GIARPS, the simultaneous observing mode of the two high-resolution spectrographs at TNG, GIANO-B and HARPS-N.
Finally, she is committed to outreach activities.