Dr Megghi Pengili

Megghi specialises in defence innovation governance, defence ecosystems and knowledge management, energy defence resources and cybersecurity in the Eastern Mediterranean, AI-Public Private Partnerships and Anticipatory Governance in defence, and other defence issues. Currently, she is a Visiting Fellow at the University of Leeds, wherefrom she obtained her PhD in Innovation’s Governance and Defence Studies (2024).Since March 2025 Megghi started as a Senior Advisor at TRENDS US in Washington D.C., and in January 2026 she is engaged as Adjunct Faculty to the Master Program " Security and Emergency Logistics" CeFLI/ Centro Alti Studi Difesa Rome (CASD), Italy. She has presented and published her research within Europe and beyond, while also designing and arranging editorial roundtables and academic entrepreneurship workshops. A recipient of various scholarships within and beyond Europe, she is “George C.Marshall Centre” Alumna and Scholar (2007 and 2025), Chevening Scholar (2011), and was a Visiting Non-Resident researcher at the Blavatnik Centre for Interdisciplinary Cyber Studies, University of Tel Aviv, (2021-2025). Megghi’s working experience was in national defence institutions, and regional environmental organisations. She has also attended numerous trainings and professional courses in military and defence institutions within and beyond Italy, her country. She has been the Assistant Editor of Civil Wars Journal since 2022. Since January 2025 she is external staff at EUConnect Programme, CIFE Berlin; also served as adjunct faculty at the “George C.Marshall Centre” for the Program on Cyber Security Studies in March-May 2025.