Ambassador Michele Pala participated this morning in the opening session of the international conference “Protein Folding in Real Time: From Molecules to Disease,” being held at the Medica Hall at the Karolinska Institutetin Stockholm. At this event, to which more than 50 researchers from around the world were invited, together with a large and extremely interested audience, the Ambassadors of Italy, Japan, and Spain renewed their commitment to developing ever more and better strategic international scientific collaborations to promote these health. research.
The event marked the launch of a strategic initiative funded by the Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet) aimed at studying and reproducing protein dynamics at extremely high spatial resolution, down to the level of the single molecule.
In his speech, Ambassador Pala, after recalling Italy’s globally recognized contribution to life sciences research, added: “We are truly proud to support this event, organized by the Karolinska Institutet together with other leading Swedish universities. Italian scientists and researchers from around the world are participating to contribute to the advancement of biomedical research.”
The conference is dedicated to research and understanding protein dynamics, a topic to which Italian scientists have contributed with fundamental research in biochemistry and biophysics with experimental, theoretical, and computational research. Not least, the statistical-mechanical studies of the Nobel Prize Professor Giorgio Parisi that introduced new tools for studying the dynamics of complex systems such as proteins.
The conference continued with the presentation by the Scientific Director of the European Spallation Source, the Italian Giovanna Fragneto. The conference will continue in the afternoon and the following days, attempting to answer the many open questions about protein structure and dynamics, understand how to enable real-time studies of proteins in vivo, and, above all, how connect these studies to theoretical models predictive of specific human health pathologies.
Improving and strengthening cooperation between Italy and Sweden in life sciences is one of the priority for the Italian Embassy to support the country’s investments in this sector and ensure the benefits that biomedical research can offer. National strategies combined with synergistic international partnerships can stimulate progress, not only by creating significant returns for society, but also for our pharmaceutical industry.
