Franca trained at the University of Padova, Italy, and then as a postdoctoral fellow in the Laboratory of Ron Germain at the NIH, USA. Franca then joined the Basel Institute for Immunology in Basel, Switzerland, where she became interested in antigen presentation by dendritic cells in vivo. Since 1994 Franca has been leading the Immune Cell Biology group at the Malaghan Institute of Medical Research, New Zealand with a focus on developing immune therapies for cancer and allergies. Her current work examines dendritic cell diversity during the initiation of CD4+ helper T cell responses. Franca Ronchese is a Programme Leader at the Malaghan Institute of Medical Research in Wellington, NZ, and Research Professor at Victoria University of Wellington.