Cecilia Clementi is an Italian-American scientist who specialises in the simulation of biomolecules. She is a Professor of Computational Biophysics at the

Free University of Berlin The Free University of Berlin (, often abbreviated as FU Berlin or simply FU) is a public research university in Berlin, Germany. It is consistently ranked among Germany's best universities, with particular strengths in political science and t ...

. She was previously a Professor of Chemistry at the

Rice University William Marsh Rice University (Rice University) is a Private university, private research university in Houston, Houston, Texas. It is on a 300-acre campus near the Houston Museum District and adjacent to the Texas Medical Center. Rice is ranke ...

and co-director of the

National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the United States government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National I ...

Molecular Sciences Software Institute. From 2017 to 2019 she held an

Einstein Foundation The Einstein Foundation Berlin is a foundation based in Berlin, Germany "that aims to promote science and research of top international caliber in Berlin and to establish the city as a centre of scientific excellence." The foundation supports rese ...

fellowship.

Early life and education

Clementi is from

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

. She studied physics at the

University of Florence The University of Florence (Italian: ''Università degli Studi di Firenze'', UniFI) is an Italian public research university located in Florence, Italy. It comprises 12 schools and has around 50,000 students enrolled. History The first universi ...

, where she earned her

Laurea In Italy, the ''laurea'' is the main post-secondary academic degree. The name originally referred literally to the laurel wreath, since ancient times a sign of honor and now worn by Italian students right after their official graduation ceremony ...

in 1995. After graduating in physics, Clementi moved to the

International School for Advanced Studies The International School for Advanced Studies (Italian: ''Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati''; SISSA) is an international, state-supported, post-graduate-education and research institute in Trieste, Italy. SISSA is active in the ...

for her doctoral degree. Clementi was a postdoctoral fellow at the

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...

, where she was part of the La Jolla Interfaces in Science programme. After completing her postdoctoral research Clementi was appointed as an assistant professor at

Research and career

In 2009 Clementi was made a Professor of Chemistry at Rice University. Her research considers the simulation of complex biophysical processes using large-scale data sets. She specialises in coarse-grain modeling of macromolecular systems. In 2016 Clementi was made co-director of the

Molecular Sciences Software Institute. Clementi joined the

in 2017 as an

fellow, during which she focussed on the multi-scale modelling of biophysical systems in an effort to better understand cellular functions. She was the first Einstein Foundation fellow to be appointed to their Strategic Professorships Program. Clementi was made a Professor of Physics at the Free University of Berlin in June 2020.

Awards and honours

* 2004

National Science Foundation CAREER Award The National Science Foundation CAREER awards, presented by the National Science Foundation (NSF), are in support of junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through research and education, and the integration of these endeavors i ...

* 2007 Hamill Innovation award * 2009

Robert A. Welch Foundation The Welch Foundation, based in Houston, Texas, is one of the United States' oldest and largest private funding sources for chemistry researchers. It is a non-profit organization named for Robert Alonzo Welch, an industrialist who provided the funds ...

Norman Hackerman Award in Chemical Research * 2014 Hamill Innovation award

Selected publications

* * * * The complete list of publication is available on Google scholar

Underwater photography

Clementi is also a scuba divemaster and underwater photographer. Some of her photographs are shown in her Instagram page

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Clementi, Cecilia Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Computational biologists Biophysicists American people of Italian descent University of Florence alumni Academic staff of the Free University of Berlin Women computational biologists Women biophysicists Italian biophysicists American biophysicists 21st-century American women scientists American women academics