Dr Luciana Vaccaro, 47, began her university studies in her hometown of Naples, Italy. She started her career at CERN, in Switzerland, before receiving her Ph.D. at EPFL, and being appointed senior lecturer at the Institute of Microengineering, University of Neuchâtel, Switzerland. 

In 2006, she became director of postgraduate programmes in Health Economics and Management at University of Lausanne, Switzerland. In 2009, she went back to EPFL in order to set up and manage the Grants office whose mission focused mainly on Swiss and European research funding. 

Appointed Rector of HES-SO on October 1st, 2013, she leads the largest university of applied sciences and arts in Switzerland with more than 21’000 students and 28 schools active in six academic fields. Since 2015, she has been a member of the Foundation Council and Executive Committee of the Swiss National Science Foundation.