Giuseppe Brancato

Giuseppe Brancato is Assistant Professor at SNS since 2014, after joining SNS in 2011 as a Research fellow, and the Head of the SNS Computational Nano-Biology group.
He received a M.Sc. in Chemistry with honors from the University of Bologna in 1999 and a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 2003, working in the field of Theoretical and Computational Chemistry.
He was a postdoc in different national and international institutions, including New York University, University of Neaples “Federico II” and the Italian Institute of Technology. He has been associated to the Italian Chemical Society (SCI), the Italian Biophysics Society, the Interuniversity Consortium on Materials Science and Technology (INSTM), the Center of Colloid and Surface Science (CSGI) and the National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN).
He represents SNS as a partner of the European initiative Bioexcel. He was member of the board of directors of CASPUR computing center in Rome and he is a member of the board of directors of CSGI. He participates to the national INFN Initiative “Biophys” as the coordinator of a research unit (1 of 10 units nationwide). He has covered several institutional roles at SNS, among which research fellow representative at the Faculty of Sciences council, member of the research commission for the attribution of the research fellowships, member of the electoral commission for the election of the Director of SNS and member of the Equal Opportunities committee.
His teaching activity in recent years includes various courses at undergraduate and PhD level, such as “Fundaments of Quantum Mechanics and Statistical Mechanics”, “Molecular Modeling of Bio and Nano Systems”, “Methods and Models for Molecular Sciences”, “Astrobiology” and “Computational Life and Material Sciences”. His main scientific interests concern the theoretical development of molecular dynamics methodologies, the computational study of optical and magnetic molecular probes and the computational study of biological systems.
Specifically, his interests in biological channels and pores include the Alpha-Hemolysin protein, the mechano-sensitive channel at large conductance MscL, the serotonin 5-HT3A receptor channel, the Ferritin protein channels, whose studies appeared recently on scientific journals like PlosOne, BBA-Biomembranes and The Journal of Bio-logical Chemistry.
He has been the supervisor or co-supervisor of 3 PhD students and 8 postdocs, which have successfully continued their research carriers. Currently, his group is formed by 4 international postdocs and one PhD student. He has several international collaborations with research groups in Spain, Germany, UK, Netherlands and USA, as well as national research groups.
In the last five years, he was funded by two national research program (PRIN and FIRB), a bilateral program (Italy-Serbia), two SNS research programs, one regional FAS Health program and by INFN. He is co-author of more than 60 papers on peer-reviewed journals and 3 book chapters. He was invited speaker in >20 national and international conferences. He has co-organized 3 national conference and 4 international CECAM workshops. He was reviewer of many international scientific journals, such as J. Am. Chem. Soc., J. Phys. Chem. Lett., Comput. Phys. Comm., European Phys. J., J. Biol. Chem, as well as reviewer for the University of Turin and the MIUR National projects.