Heritage Group Award to Giulia Babbi

Giulia Babbi, a researcher at the University of Bologna, is among the winners of the Heritage Group Award 2024, presented by SIB - Italian Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology to young researchers who have distinguished themselves for the innovation of their studies. MultifacetedProtDB, the largest database of multifunctional human proteins, developed at the University of Bologna’s Biocomputing Group in collaboration with Elisa Bertolini, Castrense Savojardo, Pier Luigi Martelli, and Rita Casadio, made it possible for her to obtain this prestigious recognition.

After a Master’s degree in Bioinformatics, Giulia obtained her PhD in 2019. She carries out scientific activity in the field of computational biochemistry, focusing on the relationship between genes and disease, the connections between phenotypes and biological processes, the annotation of proteins, and the development of resources for the scientific community. She participated in the European project H2020-CIRCLES, developing bioinformatics tools for managing and analysing biological big data and maintaining and improving databases of genes and diseases, especially the resources collected in Bioinformatic Sweeties. She is currently dedicated to identifying targets for innovative drugs through bioinformatic analyses within the Spoke 8 “In silico Medicine & OMICS Data” of the project supported by the ICSC - Italian Research Centre on High Performance Computing, Big Data, and Quantum Computing.

MultifacetedProtDB is a key tool for the study of multifunctional proteins. These proteins are particularly versatile and capable of performing multiple molecular functions in different biological processes, from metabolism and gene regulation to cell communication. Often involved in the onset and progression of diseases, these proteins can become potential therapeutic targets, thus opening new perspectives for pharmacological research.