Director, Principal Investigator
Other positions:
Professor of Medical Genetics, Department of Translational Medicine, University of Naples "Federico II", Italy.
Visiting Professor, Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Jan and Dan Duncan Neurological Research Institute, Houston, TX, USA.
Prof. Ballabio obtained his M.D. degree at the University of Naples, where he completed his residency in Pediatrics. After working as post-doctoral fellow at the Institute of Genetics and Biophysics in Naples and at Guy’s hospital in London UK, in 1989 he moved to the Department of Molecular and Human Genetics of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston TX USA, where he became Associate Professor and Co-director of the Human Genome Center. He moved back to Italy in 1994 to become the founding director of TIGEM. He has published over 360 articles in international peer-reviewed journals and contributed to 19 chapters of prestigious international books such as "Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine" and "Molecular Bases of Inherited Disease". He is “inventor” of 7 international patents. Prof Ballabio has been a member of many committees of international bodies, such as the European Commission, the European Research Council and the EMBO Council. He is a former President of the Euopean Society of Human Genetics. He is a Co-Founder of Casma Therapeutics in Boston USA and an Advisory Board member of Next Generation Diagnostics and of Avilar Therapeutics. In 2007 he was awarded the title of Commendatore della Repubblica Italiana and received the silver medal for merit. He is a three-time winner (in 2010, 2016 and 2023) of the European Research Council (ERC) Advanced Grant. In 2016, he was the first scientist in Italy to receive the prestigious Louis-Jeantet Prize for Medicine for his contribution to understanding the molecular mechanisms controlling the function of lysosomes in health and disease. In 2020 he was awarded the title “Grande Ufficiale” of the Italian Republic. He is the 2021 winner of the Feltrinelli prize in biology of the Accademia dei Lincei.
