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Brief history Research in crystallography at the Department of Chemical Sciences of the University of Trieste started in the mid-1960s with Prof. Alberto Ripamonti, who studied inorganic polymers. When Professor Ripamonti moved to Naples in 1970, the focus of research switched to small molecule crystallography and, over time, the staff acquired expertise in structural inorganic chemistry (zeolites, oxygen carriers, vitamin B12 simple models, organometallics, platinum nucleobase and Ru dimethylsulphoxide complexes) and, to a lesser extent, organic chemistry (Schiff bases and tiocyclophanes). Several young (at that time) research students who learned crystallography in this lab are now full professors in Italian Universities. For many years, the crystallographic research conducted in Trieste remained within the area of chemistry and led to many collaborations with national and foreign research groups. Among these, I would particularly like to mention the long-term collaborations with Professors Andrew Woicicki (USA) , Luigi G. Marzilli (USA), and Bernhard Lippert (Germany). Since 1980, the research orientation of the laboratory has moved from structural inorganic and organometallic chemistry to bioinorganic chemistry, including crystallography of medium-sized molecules, such as cobalamins. An extensive co-operation with crystallographers from former Yugoslavia, particularly from Zagreb (Professor Boris Kamenar) and Ljubljana (Professor Venceslav Kaucic), has taken place through the organisation of regional joint meetings. During the most recent, held in Brioni (Croatia) at the end of 2000, it was suggested to extend links to include other countries of central Europe and it was decided to organise the 1st Central European Conference Chemistry towards Biology, which will be held this year in Slovenia (September, 2002). Because of the war in former Yugoslavia, in May 1991 I was requested to host the 13st European Crystallographic Meeting in Trieste, which should have been taken place in Ljubljana in September. I accepted and, thanks to additional support from local Institutions, the meeting was held in Trieste; as was the satellite meeting "Synchrotron Radiation in Crystallography" a week later, which I also had been entrusted to organise. When the Elettra synchrotron became operational in 1994-95, international co-operation was extended to several crystallographer groups of central European countries, who organized joint meeting within CEREX ( the Central European Program for Research and Education in X-ray diffraction).
In the mid-1990s it became clear that in the future, the new challenges in crystallography would mainly come from biocrystallography and the Trieste laboratory started a gradual transition from chemical crystallography to biocrystallography, assisted by initial financial support from the University. With additional funds, it was possible to establish a well-equipped laboratory for crystallisation of biological material and to implement the apparatus for X-ray data collection, to complement that of the nearby Elettra synchrotron. The first structural analysis of proteins started. However, it is well known that biocrystallography is not simply crystallography of biological material, but it should be carried out within the biochemistry and biology framework, in addition to that of chemistry. Thus, when two years ago the Ministero della Ricerca Scientifica e Tecnologica (MURST) opened the call for Centres of Excellence for Research, I co-ordinated a group of scientists from a number of Italian Universities, working in structural, computational and molecular biology, in the preparation of an application for a Centre of Excellence in Biocrystallography/CEB for the study of proteins and their interactions with small molecules and DNA. The National committee of MURST acquired the opinion of several international referees' and in April 2001 decided the approval and co-funding of the proposal.
Prof. Lucio Randaccio
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