Professor Di Ieva received his Medical Degree in 2002 and specialisation in Neurosurgery in 2007 in Italy. He was a consultant neurosurgeon in Milan from 2007 to 2009, mainly involved in the treatment of brain and pituitary tumours, working closely with ENT and craniomaxillofacial surgeons, oncologists and radiation oncologists, as well as in the emergency management of neurotrauma. He also worked as a researcher at the Centre for Anatomy and Cell Biology of the Medical University of Vienna, Austria, from 2009 to 2011, where he completed a PhD in Clinical Neurosciences (introducing innovative methods in neuropathology and MRI). He was appointed A/Professor of Neuroanatomy in 2012 and was invited multiple times to teach neurotraumatology and neurosurgery in several countries, including Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, USA, and UAE. Professor Di Ieva completed a 3-year clinical & research fellowship in skull base surgery in 2014 at the St. Michael's Hospital, University of Toronto, where he also gained further experience in the Gamma Knife radiosurgery and continued to perform emergency neurosurgery in one of the largest trauma centres of Ontario, Canada. His multidisciplinary experience allowed him to lead the publication of the “Handbook of Skull Base Surgery” (Thieme, New York, 2015), which is one of the most used books in the field worldwide. In 2015 Dr. Di Ieva moved to Sydney, where he worked further in general neurosurgery and complex spine surgery (mainly at the Macquarie University Hospital, North Shore Private and Royal North Shore Hospitals, and Sydney Adventist Hospital), earning the fellowship with the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons in 2017.

He is a full time consultant neurosurgeon at Macquarie Neurosurgery and Macquarie University Hospital and Professor of Neurosurgery at Macquarie University.

Clinical Expertise

Neuro-oncology (surgical and multidisciplinary treatment of tumours and cancer of the central and peripheral nervous systems); pituitary and skull base surgery (including treatment of complex tumours and conditions affecting the cranial nerves and the craniocervical junction); pain treatment (including microvascular decompression and percutaneous treatments for craniofacial pain and hemifacial spasm, decompression of peripheral nerves, spine surgery, neuromodulation); microneurosurgery, endoscopic and minimally invasive (“keyhole”) neurosurgery; awake surgery and neuromonitoring; hydrocephalus; neurotraumatology, including the multidisciplinary management of traumatic brain and spine injuries and post-concussion patients.

Academic qualifications

• Professor of Neurosurgery, Macquarie University
• Professor of Neurosurgery, Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research
• Associate Professor of Neuroanatomy, Medical University of Vienna, Austria
• ARC Future Fellow (2020-2024)
• MD, summa cum laude (2002)
• European Board in Neurosurgery (2007)
• PhD in Clinical Neurosciences (2011)
• FRACS (Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, RACS)
• 2019 John Mitchell Crouch Fellowship, RACS
• Fellowship in Skull Base Surgery and Neuro-oncology (St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, Canada)
• Fellowship in General and Spine Surgery (Royal North Shore Hospital, North Shore Private Hospital and Sydney Adventist Hospital, Sydney)
• Associate Investigator, Australian Research Council (ARC) Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders (until 2018)
• Associate Member of the Centre for Elite Performance, Expertise and Training, Macquarie University
• Board Member of the Society for Brain Mapping & Therapeutics, USA (until 2019)
• Neurosurgery VMO at Nepean Hospital, Kingswood

Dr. Di Ieva is a Professor of Neurosurgery and Associate Professor of Neuroanatomy. He has published more than 200 peer-reviewed articles, 4 books, and several book chapters and won 8 international awards in Neurosurgery and Neurosciences. Moreover, he is a peer-reviewer for several international scientific and surgical journals. Dr. Di Ieva’s primary research interests are in neuroanatomy, neuroimaging and computational neurosciences, focused on the application of advanced computer-based analyses (including AI) in the field of clinical neurosciences. The main aims of his researches are finding new indicators of disease (diagnostic, prognostic and therapeutic biomarkers), which may be useful in the clinical setting to benefit patients affected by neurological and neurosurgical diseases. Dr. Di Ieva leads a translational multidisciplinary collaboration of several scientists and physicians from different disciplines, and he was the Editor and main author of an innovative textbook, the “Fractal Geometry of the Brain” (Springer, New York, 2016; second Edition in 2024).

In 2018, he founded the Computational NeuroSurgery (CNS) Lab, where diseases of neurosurgical relevance are studied by means of computational modelling and AI. In 2022, he created the first Computational Neurosurgery fellowship in the world, open to a neurosurgeon with interest and expertise in AI. Prof. Di Ieva is also the chief editor of Computational Neurosurgery textbook (Springer, 2024).

Professor Di Ieva has organised national and international workshops and trained several registrars and post-specialisation fellows, medical and undergraduate students, PhD and post-doc candidates in several countries, including Australia, USA and Canada, in the fields of surgery, neuroanatomy and research. He is involved in medical device innovation, patenting and trialling new surgical devices that will improve surgery and patients’ outcome.

He is the recipient of the John Mitchell Crouch Fellowship 2019, the most prestigious research award of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS), as well as an ARC (Australian Research Council) Future Fellowship (2020-2024) and 2 NHMRC Ideas Grant as CI.

Prof. Di Ieva has received about $8Mil in research grants and industry funds over the last 5 years.

Dr. Di Ieva’s academic mission is to continue research and teaching, collaborating in scientific and clinical projects in a translational and multidisciplinary way, with the final goal of advancing medicine to improve patients’ quality of life worldwide.

He is always very keen to brainstorm with people who love to think outside of the box. Any students and researchers are welcome to join him in any collaboration.

Computational Neurosurgery Lab

Laboratory at Macquarie University, supported and funded by Macquarie University, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, and RACS (John Mitchell Crouch Fellowship 2019):

https://www.mq.edu.au/research/research-centres-groups-and-facilities/groups/computational-neurosurgery-lab

The first lab in Australasia where advanced computational modelling (e.g, fractal-based analysis, artificial intelligence, advanced image analysis and neuroimaging) is applied to the study of brain diseases of neurosurgical interest, namely brain tumours and cerebrovascular diseases, among others.

Fields of Research

Neuroanatomy, Neuroimaging, Neurosurgery, Skull Base Surgery, MRI markers, biomarkers, Computational modelling, fractals, AI, Brain & Pituitary tumours, angiogenesis & microvascularisation, brain tumours spectroscopy, cognitive neurosciences, image analysis, connectomics, cognitive neurosciences, machine vision, history of medicine.