During her B.Sc. and M.Sc., Elisa started using metagenomics in order to investigate patterns of microbial diversity in a broad range of aquatic environments and the functional potential of the communities inhabiting them, both in terms of metabolic adaptations and secondary metabolites production. 

Microbial ecology has always been her main field of interest and currently her studies focus on the functional metagenomics of sediment microbial communities, with particular attention to blue carbon habitats.