He graduated (110/110L) in Biological Sciences in 2005 and in Behavioural Biology in 2007. In 2012, he earned a PhD in Ethology and Animal Ecology at the University of Florence, studying immunity in social hymenopteran colonies.
From 2013 to 2015, he worked as a Marie Curie Fellow at Queen Mary University of London, focusing on the cognitive abilities of bumblebees. From 2015 to 2018, he worked at Université Toulouse III and Université Paris13, studying behavioural plasticity, learning, and memory in bees and ants, while also investigating chemical and visual communication in Stenogastrinae wasps.
He returned to Italy in 2018 as a Rita-Levi-Montalcini Fellow. Since 2021, he has been an Associate Professor at the University of Florence, where he directs a laboratory dedicated to social insect cognition. His research group studies how bees and wasps perceive, process, and respond to environmental information, investigating complex cognitive abilities, motivation, and learning processes. The lab also examines the effects of biopesticides and microplastics on pollinators’ health.
He has appeared as an invited speaker at international conferences, including Neuroethology-2022 (Lisbon), the European Congress of Entomology-2018 (Naples), SFECA-2015 (Strasbourg), and EURBEE-2014 (Murcia), and as a keynote speaker at the IUSSI International Congress-2026 (Freiburg) and ESCBC-2022 (Trento).

Baciadonna L, Macri C, Baracchi D†, & Giurfa, M† (2026). Exploring emotional expression in invertebrates: Mechanisms, functions, and phylogeny. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, In press. † Equal contribution. https://doi.org/ 10.1098/rstb.2025.0146

Cappa F, Pasquini E, Ibraliu A, Muti G, Ferrante F, Baracchi D (2025). Revealing antagonistic interactions in the adverse effects of polystyrene and polymethylmethacrylate microplastics in bumble bees. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 292(2043), 20250047. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2025.0047

Baracchi D, Cabirol A, Devaud JM, Haase A, d’Ettorre P, Giurfa M (2020). Pheromone components affect motivation and induce persistent modulation of associative learning and memory in honey bees. Communications Biology, 3(1): 1-9. https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-020-01183-x

Baracchi D, Marples A, Jenkins AJ, Leitch AR, Chittka L (2017). Nicotine in floral nectar pharmacologically influences bumblebee learning of floral features. Scientific Reports, 7: 1951. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-01980-1

Baracchi D, Petrocelli I, Chittka L, Ricciardi G, Turillazzi S (2015). Speed and accuracy in nestmate recognition: a hover wasp prioritises face recognition over colony odour cues to minimise intrusion by outsiders. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 282: 20142750. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2014.2750