Ilaria Fontana received her PhD from the University of Montpellier in March 2022, where she worked under the supervision of Prof. Daniele A. Di Pietro on a CIFRE-funded project in collaboration with EDF. After completing her PhD, she was a Visiting Assistant Professor in the ESAM Department at Northwestern University (2022–2024). She is now a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Arizona.
Her research focuses on developing and analyzing numerical methods for problems in mechanics, electromagnetics, and fluid dynamics. She works with finite element, high-order discontinuous Galerkin, and spectral methods. At the University of Arizona, she collaborates with Prof. Lise-Marie Imbert-Gérard on quasi-Trefftz techniques for scalar and vector-valued partial differential equations, a novel class of high-order discontinuous schemes tailored to the underlying equations.