People

PhD candidates

I have a background in medieval manuscript culture in Latin and both Old and Middle English, textual editing, and philosophy. My master’s thesis at the University of Saskatchewan, Canada, included producing an edition of Ælfric of Eynsham’s 10th-century Grammar, the first translation of a Latin grammar into any European vernacular, composed in Latin and Old English. Since completing my master’s program I have been a Research Fellow of the Canterbury Tales Project and a copy editor for the Journal of the Northern Renaissance. My MECANO project involves investigating the processes of canonization and canon formation within the fluid corpus of anonymous and pseudonymous late antique and medieval sermons. I am especially interested in exploring the ways in which scholarship may construct post hoc canons which might not accurately reflect the historical reception of the works in question.

Valeria Irene Boano

My name is Valeria and I come from Milano, in Italy, where I studied at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. I earned both my bachelor’s degree and my master’s degree in Classics, with a focus on language and linguistics. During the master, I integrated my studies with Computational Linguistics applied to Latin. My interests include NLP for Ancient Languages, Linked Open Data and Digital Classics.

Leonardo D'Addario

I am a PhD candidate in Ancient Greek Literature and History at Leipzig Univeristy. My research investigates the reception of fragmentary ancient Greek historians in Polybius. Specifically, I focuses on the language that Polybius employs when quoting other historiographers. I compelted both BA and MA degrees at the University of Pisa and the Scuola Normale Superiore, where I also studied Archaich Lyric Poetry, with a special focus on Pindar and Greek metre.

Doaa Elalfy

I am Doaa Elalfy, with an academic background that bridges pharmacy, classical languages, and translation. I hold a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy and a bachelor’s degree in Ancient Greek and Latin, providing me with a strong foundation in both medical sciences and classical philology. Additionally, I earned a Diploma in Arabic Christian Heritage, further expanding my expertise in historical and linguistic studies. I have worked as a pharmacist, university teaching assistant, and Arabic-English translator, gaining experience in both practical and academic fields. My research focuses on the intersection of medicine, ancient languages, and intercultural transmission. I completed a master’s degree in medical Papyrology, where I examined medical knowledge preserved in papyri and ostraca. Currently, as part of the MECANO project, my PhD research investigates the lexical evolution of medical terminology from Greek to Arabic, tracing semantic shifts in medical texts and their impact on translation and medical practice.

Jonas Fischer

I am a Doctoral Researcher in Digital Humanities at the Faculty of Arts at the University of Helsinki. I have a background in Ancient History and I’m currently a member of the MSCA doctoral network MECANO and the Helsinki Computational History Group. My research focus is on the presence of the classics in early modern British book history, especially regarding the reception and reuse of ancient texts and their publication patterns in the printing industry.

Nastas Jakšić

I hold a BA in Philosophy and Classics and an MA in Classics from the University of Belgrade, as well as an MA in Ancient Philosophy from LMU Munich. Currently, I am pursuing a PhD within the framework of the MECANO project, in a cotutelle arrangement between Helsinki University and KU Leuven, focusing on ancient sources in late medieval commentaries on Aristotle’s Physics and Metaphysics. Additionally, I am passionate about ancient philosophy in general, Latin and Ancient Greek.

Marin-Marie Le Bris

I hold a research master’s degree in philosophy from Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and I additionally studied political science and finance at Sciences Po and HEC Paris. Before joining Radboud Universiteit as a PhD candidate in September 2024, I worked in knowledge valorisation roles for an independent publisher and a think tank. My research project focuses on the reception of Graeco-Roman antiquity in 20th-century public discourse.

Luisa Ripoll-Alberola

I come from Alicante, in Spain. After obtaining my bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering from Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, I pursued a master’s degree in Statistics and Data Science, with the idea of recycling my coding expertise to explore NLP. My research interests are diverse, including library studies and scientometrics, (computational) literary studies, and AI applications to the humanities.

Gabriele Torcoletti

I am a PhD candidate in the Department of Classics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. My research focuses on Hellenistic medicine, particularly the development of pulse science and its clinical applications. By analysing ancient fragments preserved in later authors, I seek to reconstruct the physiological and pathological theories of key Hellenistic physicians. I earned both BA and MA in Classical Philology from the University of Macerata; during my MA studies, I spent two summer semesters (2023 and 2024) as a visiting student at the University of Vienna. Beyond my specific research, I have a strong interest in the interplay between ancient medical theories and their broader cultural and intellectual contexts, as well as in the relationships between different fields of knowledge in the Hellenistic period. I am particularly focused on how medicine, literature, and philosophy interrelated and influenced one another.

Timo Zarakovitis

I am Timo Zarakovitis, a new PhD at KU Leuven in the MECANO project. I have started interdisciplinary research on the canonicity of Plato’s and Aristotle’s philosophy by analysing quotation with DH approaches. It is the aim of this research to build a database of these authors being quoted in the Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca and to speak about the history of philosophy and canonization on the basis of this corpus, which spans from the second century CE until the Byzantine period.