Meneghini became interested in science under his school teacher Pietro Melo. Following school he joined the medical course at the
University of Padua in 1829-30 and obtained his medical doctorate in 1834 with a thesis on the cephalo-spinal axis and the following year, he became an assistant to Giuseppe Antonio Bonato, the chair of
botany. In 1839 he was appointed professor of preparatory sciences at Padua, a position he maintained up until 1848, when he was removed from his post due to his association with revolutionaries during the
First Italian War of Independence, in which he followed the leadership of his brother Andrea. He then went into exile to Bologna followed by Pistoia and then Florence. In 1849 he became a professor of
mineralogy and
geology at the
University of Pisa, where the position had become vacant after the death of
Leopoldo Pilla (1805–1848), who was killed in the battle of
Curtatone. He then became director of the geological cabinet. In 1874 the chair of mineralogy and geology was split into two entities, with
Antonio D'Achiardi (1839–1902) receiving the chair of mineralogy, leaving Meneghini with the chair of geology. He made contributions in his studies involving the geology of
Tuscany, identifying Triassic
fossils and worked across Italy and
Sardinia, including
Cambrian Period
trilobites found in Sardinia and
ammonites uncovered in
Lombardy and the
Apennines. He described nearly 560 fossil taxa and was involved in alpine stratigraphy and mapping. He headed the Italian Geological Committee from 1879 until his death. In 1860 he became a member of the
Académie nationale des sciences. In 1874 he was elected founding president of the
Societa Toscana di Scienze Naturali, and for a period of time, also served as president of the Italian Geological Society. Meneghini died in Pisa. The mineral
meneghinite is named after him. In 1839 the botanical genus
Meneghinia (family
Boraginaceae) was named in his honor by
Stephan Endlicher. It is now a synonym of
Arnebia == Selected works ==