A native of Verona, he graduated in medicine from the University of Turin in 1890 with a thesis titled L’immunitą nelle malattie infettive [Immunity to contagious diseases]. At the same university he became Assistant Professor of Pathological Anatomy under Pio Foą (1848-1922) and in 1900 regular professor at the University of Cagliari. During this first formative period he worked mainly on problems of bacteriology and immunity, making numerous contributions to the study of serum therapy. Having been assigned a post as temporary lecturer in Parma, he moved there, but only for a short time, since he was called upon to occupy the Chair of Medicine at the University of Pisa already in 1904. In the over thirty years he spent at that university, he devoted himself mainly to research in the sphere of anaphylaxis and hematology. He died in Pisa on March 18, 1938.