Our faculty presently consists of two associate professors, Cristian Micheletti (head) and Alessandro Laio (deputy head), one tenure-track scientist, Giovanni Bussi and one co-opted assistant professor, Alessandra Magistrato from CNR who is responsible for the Biophysics research line of the CNR-IOM Democritos Center for Atomistic Simulations in Trieste.


Main research lines in the Molecular and Statistical Biophysics Group are:


(1) Characterising the effect of spatial confinement on the structural, topological and mechanical properties of biopolymers, particularly DNA. (PI: Prof. C. Micheletti)

(2) Elucidating the relationship between structure and function in proteins and enzymes. (PI: Prof. C. Micheletti)

(3) Simulating rare events in biological systems (PI: Prof. A. Laio) Hide

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In our group we work at improving techniques for simulating rare events, in order to make them suitable for studying realistic processes. Particular attention is devoted to metadynamics , an algorithm that has been successfully applied in several different fields, ranging from chemistry to crystal structure prediction to biophysics. We are presently applying this methodology for complex transitions in biomolecules. In these cases the number of "interesting" variables that one has to sample and explore is intrinsically very large. This has led to develop a new method, bias-exchange metadynamics, that allows the simultaneous reconstruction of a free energy in several variables. his approach allows predicting the folded state and the folding time of small proteins (up to 40 amino acids) described with an accurate potential, in which the water is described explicitly (see Foding for more details). The same approach can be used for studying, also with a very accurate potential, the binding process of drugs to their target protein, predicting with great accuracy the binding affinity (see Docking for more details). (Picture taken from: J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2009, 131 (33), pp 11811-11818)


(4) Molecular Mechanisms of Diseases and Drugs (PI: Dr. A. Magistrato)

(5) Enzymatic and biomimetic catalysis (PI: Dr. A. Magistrato)

(6) Simulation of small ribonucleic acid (RNA) (PI: Dr. G. Bussi)

(7) PLUMED Development (PI: Dr. G. Bussi)