81 Notable alumni of University of Palermo

Giuseppina "Pepi" Fabbiano is an American astrophysicist. She works as senior astrophysics in the High Energy Astrophysics Division, at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. She has chaired the executive committee of the International Virtual Observatory Alliance. Fabbiano was elected a fellow of the AAAS in 2011 for her contribution to astronomy. In 2021 Fabbiano co-authored a paper that suggests that quasars...

Michele Cipolla was an Italian mathematician, mainly specializing in number theory.

Davide Aiello is a member of the Parliament of Italy. He was elected in 2018 and 2022.

Camillo Giardina was an Italian Christian Democrat politician. He was minister of health (1959–1962) in the Government of Italy.

Giuseppe Bagnera was an Italian mathematician.

Michele de Franchis was an Italian mathematician, specializing in algebraic geometry. He is known for the De Franchis theorem and the Castelnuovo–de Franchis theorem.

Raimondo Borsellino was an Italian politician. He was born in Cattolica Eraclea, and represented the Christian Democracy in the Constituent Assembly of Italy from 1946 to 1948 and in the Chamber of Deputies from 1948 to 1958.

Eleonora Troja is an Italian astrophysicist. In 2017 she led the discovery of X-ray emission from the gravitational wave source GW170817.

Agustina Casas Seré Leguizamon is an international award-winning digital artist. Her digital art collection "Ensueños Rioplatenses," was declared a "National Work of Tourist Interest" by the government of Uruguay, the highest artistic honor awarded by that nation (analogous to the United States National Medal of Arts). Casas was also officially declared a "Young Leader in Latin America" by the Washington,...

Aldo Rizzo was an Italian politician and magistrate.

Filippo Silvestri was an Italian entomologist. He specialised in world Protura, Thysanura, Diplura and Isoptera, but also worked on Hymenoptera, Myriapoda, Italian Diptera and South American ground pearls, scale insects (Hemiptera: Coccomorpha) from the family Margarodidae. He is also noted for describing and naming the previously unknown order Zoraptera. In 1938 he was nominated to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences,...

Salvatore Sanfilippo, known online as "antirez", is an Italian computer programmer, hacker and author. He is best known as the creator of the Redis in-memory database, which he developed and led for over a decade.

Giusto Catania is an Italian politician and former Member of the European Parliament for North-West with the Partito della Rifondazione Comunista (PRC), part of the European Left and sat on the European Parliament's Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs.

Giovanni Ruvolo is an Italian biologist and politician.

Pia Maria Nalli was an Italian mathematician known for her work on the summability of Fourier series, on Morera's theorem for analytic functions of several variables and for finding the solution to the Fredholm integral equation of the third kind for the first time. Her research interests ranged from algebraic geometry to functional analysis and tensor analysis; she was a...

Roberto Gambino is an Italian architect and politician.

Adolfo Omodeo was an Italian historian and politician, who served as Minister of Public Education of the Badoglio II Cabinet.

Diego Cammarata is an Italian politician.

Francesco Paolo Cantelli was an Italian mathematician. He made contributions to celestial mechanics, probability theory, and actuarial science.

Giorgio Mulé is an Italian politician and journalist. From 1 March 2021 to 19 October 2022 he was Undersecretary of State at the Ministry of Defence in the Draghi government. In the 19th legislature he was also vice-president of the Chamber of Deputies.

Maria Carolina Varchi is an Italian politician of Brothers of Italy who has served in the Chamber of Deputies since 2018. She was previously deputy mayor of Palermo from 2022 to 2024, and vice president of Young Italy from 2010 to 2012.

Turi Simeti was an Italian painter born in Alcamo, Sicily, Italy.

Nicola Badalucco was an Italian screenwriter. He has written for 38 films since 1969. He was nominated for an Academy Award at the 42nd Academy Awards in the category Original Screenplay for the film The Damned.

Salvatore Lauricella was an Italian attorney, politician, and chairman of the Italian Socialist Party.

Sergio Antonio D'Antoni is an Italian politician, syndicalist and sports manager, President of CONI Sicilia from 2014 to 2025.

Giuseppe Alessi was an Italian politician. From 1968 to 1973 he was a member of the Chamber of Deputies, and from 1963 to 1968 a member of the Senate. From 1947 to 1949 he was also President of Sicily.

Pietro Paolo Tomasi, known as Pietro Tomasi della Torretta after his title marchese della Torretta (borne by courtesy as a younger son of a Prince of Lampedusa), was an Italian politician and diplomat. He ultimately inherited the family title of Prince of Lampedusa from his nephew, Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa (d. 1957), and was its last holder either officially or...

Ignazio Messina is an Italian lawyer and politician. He is the current leader of Italy of Values.

Gaspar Schott was a German Jesuit and scientist, specializing in the fields of physics, mathematics and natural philosophy, and known for his industry.

Gaetano Arturo Crocco was an Italian scientist and aeronautics pioneer, the founder of the Italian Rocket Society, and went on to become Italy's leading space scientist. He was born in Naples.

Elda Pucci was an Italian politician and professor.

Ignazio Corrao is an Italian lawyer and politician who served as a member of the European Parliament (MEP) from 2014 to 2024. A member of the Five Star Movement (M5S) until 2020, when he became an Independent, he represented the Italian Islands constituency in the European Parliament.

C. Marcella Carollo worked as a professional astronomer for 25 years between 1994 and 2019. Her scientific career was ended by the ETH Zürich who, following accusations that she had bullied students, made her the first Professor to be dismissed at ETH Zurich in the 165 years of its history. Carollo has maintained her innocence against these accusations, publicly commenting...

Carlo Vizzini is an Italian politician. He was involved in the corruption scandal of Tangentopoli. Vizzini was found guilty but benefited from the statute of limitations and did not serve his sentence.

Renato Accorinti is an Italian politician and activist.

Filippo Mancuso was an Italian judge and politician. In 1995 he was Italy's Minister of Justice in the government of Lamberto Dini. The Italian Senate voted a motion of no confidence against him and this fact was the first time during the republican period. The left wing and Lega Nord complained about the review of the Mani pulite pool during...

Orso Mario Corbino was an Italian physicist and politician. He is noted for his studies of the influence of external magnetic fields on the motion of electrons in metals and he discovered the Corbino effect. He served as Minister for education in 1921–1922 and as Minister for National Economy in 1923–1924. He also served as professor of the University of...

Giovanni Pitruzzella is an Italian jurist and academic who has served as a Judge of the Constitutional Court of Italy since 14 November 2023. He concurrently serves as an Advocate General at the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), a position he has held since October 2018.

Piera Aiello is an Italian police informant and politician known for her stand against the Mafia. She was elected to the Chamber of Deputies. In 2019, she was named as one of the BBC's 100 Women.

Corradino Mineo is an Italian journalist and politician who served as member of the Italian Senate from 2013 to 2018.

Franco Restivo was an Italian politician.

Giuseppe Antonio Borgese was an Italian writer, journalist, literary critic, Germanist, poet, playwright, and academic naturalized American.

Calogero Antonio Mannino is an Italian politician and lawyer. He has been a member of the Christian Democracy and the Union of Christian and Centre Democrats. He served in the cabinet of Prime Ministers Spadolini (1981–1982), Fanfani (1982–1983) and Andreotti (1991–1992). He was also member of the Chamber of Deputies of Italy in Legislature VII (1976–1979), Legislature VIII (1979–1983), Legislature...

Antonino Saetta was an Italian magistrate who prosecuted several high-profile cases involving organized crime in Sicily. He and his son, Stefano, were assassinated by members of the Sicilian mafia in 1988.

Francesco Saverio Romano is an Italian politician and lawyer. He served as the minister of agricultures in 2011 and a member of the Chamber of Deputies between 2001 and 2018.

Maria Perrusi is an Italian beauty queen and model. She won Miss Italia 2009.

Antonio Starrabba, Marquess of Rudinì (16 April 1839 – 7 August 1908) was an Italian statesman, Prime Minister of Italy between 1891 and 1892 and from 1896 until 1898.

Rita Borsellino was an Italian Sicilian anti-Mafia activist, politician and, between 2009 and 2014, a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the Democratic Party.

Gaetano Costa was an Italian magistrate killed by the Cosa Nostra.

Manlio Di Stefano is an Italian politician.

Gabriella Giammanco is an Italian politician and journalist.

Arturo Dominici was an Italian film, television and voice actor.

Davide Faraone is an Italian politician who is the group leader of the Italia Viva grouping in the Senate of the Republic.

Antonino "Nino" Di Matteo is an Italian magistrate and prosecutor. Since 2012, he is serving as president of the National Magistrates Association of Palermo and from 2019 to 2023 he has been a member of the High Council of the Judiciary. Due to his anti-mafia activity, Di Matteo has been under guard since 1993.

Renato Maria Giuseppe Schifani is an Italian politician who has served as the president of Sicily since 13 October 2022. Schifani was Silvio Berlusconi's chief whip and was a prominent member of the Senate of the Republic from 1996 to 2022. From 29 April 2008 to 14 March 2013, he was the president of the Senate of the Republic.

Antonio Ingroia is an Italian lawyer, ex magistrate, politician and leader of Civil Revolution, with Luigi de Magistris, the mayor of Naples. Ingroia is also the director of a United Nations investigation against narcotraffic in Guatemala. He is also a writer and contributes regular columns to the daily newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano.

Gaetano Mosca COSML COCI SoK was an Italian political scientist, journalist and public servant. He is credited with developing the elite theory and the doctrine of the political class and is one of the three members constituting the Italian school of elitism together with Vilfredo Pareto and Robert Michels.

Simonetta Agnello Hornby is an Italian novelist and food writer. Her novels are international bestsellers, translated into more than twenty languages.

Gesualdo Bufalino, was an Italian writer who lived in Sicily for most of his life.

Caterina Chinnici is an Italian magistrate and politician who has been serving as a Member of the European Parliament since 2014.

Giuseppe Ayala is an Italian politician and magistrate. He was known as an "anti-mafia" magistrate, and served as "anti-Mafia" judge. He raised doubts about whether it was only the Mafia that was involved in the killing of Giovanni Falcone. In 1993, Ayala published a book entitled La guerra dei giusti. I giudici, la mafia, la politica (The War of the...

Carmine "Mino" Pecorelli was an Italian journalist, shot dead in Rome a year after former prime minister Aldo Moro's 1978 kidnapping and subsequent killing. He was described as a "maverick journalist with excellent secret service contacts". According to Pecorelli, Aldo Moro's kidnapping had been organized by a "lucid superpower" and was inspired by the "logic of Yalta". Pecorelli's name was...

Salvatore "Totò" Cuffaro is a former Italian politician and former President of Sicily. He has served an almost 5-year jail sentence for aiding Cosa Nostra. He has earned the nickname Vasa Vasa (Sicilian for "Kiss Kiss") for his tendency to kiss everybody; he says that he has kissed a quarter of all the people on the island.

Vito Alfio Ciancimino was an Italian politician close to the Mafia leadership who became known for enriching himself and his associates by corruptly granting planning permission. An abrasive personality, he served briefly as mayor of Palermo, Sicily, as a Christian Democrat. Ciancimino was close to Mafia boss and perennial fugitive Bernardo Provenzano, but regarded Salvatore Riina as irrational.

Aldo Renato Guttuso was an Italian painter and politician. He is considered to be among the most important Italian artists of the 20th century and is among the key figures of Italian expressionism. His art is characterized by social and political commentary, and as a member of the Italian Communist Party (PCI) he became its senator for two legislatures, from...

Francesca Laura Morvillo was an Italian magistrate, wife of Giovanni Falcone and victim of the Sicilian Mafia. On 23 May 1992, she, her husband and three police officers on their security detail were killed in the Capaci bombing.

Bernardo Mattarella was an Italian politician for the Christian Democrat party (Democrazia Cristiana, DC). He was a cabinet minister of Italy several times, becoming one of the most important politicians of his generation.

Leoluca Orlando is an Italian politician. He was mayor of Palermo for over twenty years and was president of the Italian Federation of American Football (FIDAF). He is best known for his strong opposition to the Sicilian Mafia during his mayoralty in the 1980s, which was publicly referenced in the media as the Palermo Spring (Italian: Primavera di Palermo).

Rocco Chinnici was an Italian anti-Mafia magistrate killed by the Sicilian Mafia.

Francesco Crispi was an Italian patriot and statesman. He was among the main protagonists of the Risorgimento, a close friend and supporter of Giuseppe Mazzini and Giuseppe Garibaldi, and one of the architects of Italian unification in 1860. Crispi served as Prime Minister of Italy for six years, from 1887 to 1891, and again from 1893 to 1896, and was...

Teresa Mannino is an Italian comedian, actress, and television personality.

Giulia Bongiorno is an Italian lawyer and politician who served as the Italian Minister of Public Administration from 1 June 2018 to 5 September 2019. A prominent criminal defense attorney, she has served in both houses of the Italian parliament: formerly a member of the Chamber of Deputies from 2008 to 2013, she has served as a Senator of the...

Salvatore Achille Ettore Lima, often referred to as Salvo Lima, was an Italian politician from Sicily who was associated with, and murdered by, the Sicilian Mafia. According to the pentito (Mafia defector) Tommaso Buscetta, Lima's father, Vincenzo Lima, was a member of the Mafia but it is not known whether Lima himself was a made member of Cosa Nostra. In...

Vittorio Emanuele Orlando was an Italian statesman, who served as the prime minister of Italy from October 1917 to June 1919. Orlando is best known for representing Italy in the 1919 Paris Peace Conference with his foreign minister Sidney Sonnino. He was also known as "Premier of Victory" for defeating the Central Powers along with the Entente in World War...

Pietro Grasso, also known as Piero Grasso, is an Italian anti-mafia magistrate and politician who served as President of the Senate from 2013 to 2018.

Luca Guadagnino is an Italian film director and producer. His films are characterized by their emotional complexity, eroticism, and lavish visuals. Guadagnino has received numerous accolades, including a Silver Lion and an Independent Spirit Award, alongside nominations for an Academy Award, two Golden Globes, and three BAFTAs.

Paolo Emanuele Borsellino was an Italian judge and prosecuting magistrate. From his office in the Palace of Justice in Palermo, Sicily, he spent most of his professional life trying to overthrow the power of the Sicilian Mafia. After a long and distinguished career, culminating in the Maxi Trial in 1986–1987, on 19 July 1992, Borsellino was killed by a car...

Andrea Calogero Camilleri was an Italian writer best known for his Salvo Montalbano crime novels.

Piersanti Mattarella was an Italian politician who was assassinated by the Mafia while he held the position of President of the Regional Government of Sicily. A member of Christian Democracy, he was the older brother of Sergio Mattarella, who has been president of Italy since 2015.

Giovanni Falcone was an Italian judge and prosecuting magistrate. From his office in the Palace of Justice in Palermo, Sicily, he spent most of his professional life trying to overthrow the power of the Sicilian Mafia. After a long and distinguished career, culminating in the Maxi Trial in 1986–1987, on 23 May 1992, Falcone was assassinated by the Corleonesi Mafia...