Anna Tramontano (14 July 1957 – 10 March 2017) was an Italian

computational biologist Computational biology refers to the use of data analysis, mathematical modeling and computational simulations to understand biological systems and relationships. An intersection of computer science, biology, and big data, the field also has fo ...

and chair professor of

biochemistry Biochemistry or biological chemistry is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology and ...

at the

Sapienza University of Rome The Sapienza University of Rome ( it, Sapienza – Università di Roma), also called simply Sapienza or the University of Rome, and formally the Università degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza", is a Public university, public research university l ...

. From 2011 to 2014 she was a member of the Scientific Council of the

European Research Council The European Research Council (ERC) is a public body for funding of scientific and technological research conducted within the European Union (EU). Established by the European Commission in 2007, the ERC is composed of an independent Scientific ...

(ERC). She was an associate editor for the journal ''

Bioinformatics Bioinformatics () is an interdisciplinary field that develops methods and software tools for understanding biological data, in particular when the data sets are large and complex. As an interdisciplinary field of science, bioinformatics combi ...

'' from 2005 until 2016 editing papers in the area of

structural bioinformatics Structural bioinformatics is the branch of bioinformatics that is related to the analysis and prediction of the three-dimensional structure of biological macromolecules such as proteins, RNA, and DNA. It deals with generalizations about macromol ...

Education

Tramontano originally trained as a physicist, gaining her PhD from the

University of Naples Federico II The University of Naples Federico II ( it, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II) is a public university in Naples, Italy. Founded in 1224, it is the oldest public non-sectarian university in the world, and is now organized into 26 depar ...

in 1980. She was later drawn to the field of

computational biology Computational biology refers to the use of data analysis, mathematical modeling and computational simulations to understand biological systems and relationships. An intersection of computer science, biology, and big data, the field also has fo ...

and carried out postdoctoral studies at the

University of California, San Francisco The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is a public land-grant research university in San Francisco, California. It is part of the University of California system and is dedicated entirely to health science and life science. It cond ...

where she developed the molecular graphics package InsightII. She later joined the biocomputing programme at the

European Molecular Biology Laboratory The European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) is an intergovernmental organization dedicated to molecular biology research and is supported by 27 member states, two prospect states, and one associate member state. EMBL was created in 1974 and ...

Heidelberg Heidelberg (; Palatine German language, Palatine German: ''Heidlberg'') is a city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, situated on the river Neckar in south-west Germany. As of the 2016 census, its population was 159,914 ...

to work with

Arthur Lesk Arthur Mallay Lesk, is a protein science researcher, who is a professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at the Pennsylvania State University in University Park. Education Lesk received a bachelor's degree, magna cum laude, from Harvard Uni ...

on analysis and modelling of

antibodies An antibody (Ab), also known as an immunoglobulin (Ig), is a large, Y-shaped protein used by the immune system to identify and neutralize foreign objects such as pathogenic bacteria and viruses. The antibody recognizes a unique molecule of the ...

Awards and honours

Tramontano served as vice-president of the

International Society for Computational Biology The International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) is a scholarly society for researchers in computational biology and bioinformatics. The society was founded in 1997 to provide a stable financial home for the Intelligent Systems for Mole ...

(ISCB), and was elected a Fellow of the ISCB in 2016. She served on the ISCB Board of Directors since its beginning, and was a Senior Member of the ISCB for many years.

Capacity building in Computational Biology

Tramontano actively engaged in

capacity building particularly for developing countries. She supported capacity building efforts of one of the regional student groups (RSG Eastern Africa) affiliated to the ISCB Student Council (ISCBSC) by giving a 3-day course. She traveled to Nairobi, Kenya and sponsored students from the neighboring region (Uganda and Tanzania) to attend a 3-day Proteomics course that she taught. In addition, she connected students from Africa interested in Bioinformatics to various labs in Europe, including her own, for internships or advanced study . She later went on to assist in securing a King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) funding for a large number of travel fellowships that were awarded to students from Africa to attend the

ISCB Africa ASBCB Conference on Bioinformatics The ISCB Africa ASBCB Conference on Bioinformatics is a biennial academic conference on the subjects of bioinformatics and computational biology, organized by the African Society for Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (ASBCB). The conferenc ...

ASBCB
"Joint ISCB Africa ASBCB Conference, 2009"
''Joint ISCB Africa ASBCB Conference'', 2009 held in

Bamako, Mali Bamako ( bm, ߓߡߊ߬ߞߐ߬ ''Bàmakɔ̌'', ff, 𞤄𞤢𞤥𞤢𞤳𞤮 ''Bamako'') is the capital and largest city of Mali, with a 2009 population of 1,810,366 and an estimated 2022 population of 2.81 million. It is located on the Niger River ...

in 2009.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tramontano, Anna 1957 births 2017 deaths Italian bioinformaticians Fellows of the International Society for Computational Biology Scientific computing researchers Italian women computer scientists Academic staff of the Sapienza University of Rome University of Naples Federico II alumni Members of the ERC Scientific Council Scientists from Naples