Angelo Maffucci

Who was Angelo Maffucci?

Angelo Maria Maffucci was an Italian pathologist born in the town of Calitri.

In 1872 he received his doctorate at Naples, where afterwards he became an assistant at the institute of pathology under Otto von Schrön. Later he was a professor of pathology in Messina, Catania and Pisa. At the University of Pisa he became the school's first director of pathological anatomy. He remained at Pisa until his death in 1903.

Maffucci is remembered for isolating the bacteria that causes avian tuberculosis. He also discovered that the avian type of tuberculosis had a different aetiology than human and bovine types. In 1881 he described a disorder characterized by enchondromatosis associated with multiple cavernous angiomas. This disorder was to become known as "Maffucci's syndrome", which he documented in an article titled Di un caso encondroma ed angioma multiplo.