AFFILIATION:
Magnetic Resonance Center and Department of Chemistry
University of Florence

ADDRESS:
Via L. Sacconi 6
50019 Sesto Fiorentino, (FI) -Italy

CONTACTS:
Tel: +39 055 4574263/73
e-mail: banci[at]cerm.unifi.it ; lucia.banci[at]unifi.it

RESEARCH PROFILES:
ORCID_ID profile
Google scholar profile
University of Florence page

Lucia Banci is Professor of Chemistry at the University of Florence.  She has an extensive expertise and has provided original contributions and breakthroughs in Structural Biology and in biological NMR. She has addressed and unraveled many aspects of the biology of metal ions in biological systems.
The innovative in cell NMR approach developed by Lucia Banci and her group allows for the detection of human individual proteins in living human cells with atomic level resolution. She also exploited the extensive knowledge of structural biology approaches through NMR expertise to develop an absolutely innovative approach to vaccine design, based on the knowledge of the structure of the pathogen antigens and of the interaction pattern with antibodies, to design structure-based vaccines.
Lucia Banci is one of the founders and past Director of the Center of Magnetic Resonance (CERM) of the University of Florence. She is the Head of the Italian Core Center of the ESFRI Research Infrastructure Instruct-ERIC, and a member of the Instruct-ERIC Executive Committee and of the Council.

Full CV Engl

 Full CV Ita

RESEARCH FIELDS:

In-cell NMR, Structural Biology, Structural Vaccinology, Metals in biology, Iron-sulfur protein biogenesis

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS (2010-2024):

Costantino A, Pham L.B.T, Barbieri L, Calderone V, Ben-Nissan G, Sharon M, Banci L, Luchinat E., Controlling the incorporation of fluorinated amino acids in human cells and its structural impact, Protein Science, 33 (3), art. no. e4910, 2024, doi: 10.1002/pro.4910

Luchinat E, Barbieri L, Davis B, Brough PA, Pennestri M, Banci L. Ligand-Based Competition Binding by Real-Time 19F NMR in Human Cells. J Med Chem. 2024 Jan 25;67(2):1115-1126. doi: 10.1021/acs.jmedchem.3c01600

Lan B. T. Pham, A Costantino, L Barbieri, V Calderone, E Luchinat, L, Banci. Direct expression of fluorinated proteins in human cells for 19F in-cell NMR spectroscopy. Am. Chem. Soc. 145, 2, 1389–1399, doi.org/10.1021/jacs.2c12086, 2023 (IF 16.383).

Luchinat E, Cremonini M, Banci L. Radio Signals from Live Cells: The Coming of Age of In-Cell Solution NMR, Chemical Reviews, DOI: 10.1021/acs.chemrev. 1c00790. 2022

Matteucci S, Camponeschi F, Clémancey M, Ciofi-Baffoni S, Blondin G, Banci L. In-cellulo Mӧssbauer and EPR studies bring new evidences to the long-standing debate on the iron-sulfur cluster binding in human anamorsin. Angew Chem Int Ed 60: 14841–14845, 2021

Camponeschi F, Prusty NR, Heider SAE, Ciofi-Baffoni S, Banci L. GLRX3 Acts as a [2Fe-2S] Cluster Chaperone in the Cytosolic Iron-Sulfur Assembly Machinery Transferring [2Fe-2S] Clusters to NUBP1. J Am Chem Soc 142: 10794-10805, 2020

Luchinat E., Barbieri L., Cremonini M., Nocentini A., Supuran C.T., Banci L. Drug screening in human cells by NMR allows early assessment of drug potency, Chem. Int. Ed. 59: 6535 –6539, 2020

Luchinat E, Banci L. In-Cell NMR in Human Cells: Direct Protein Expression Allows Structural Studies of Protein Folding and Maturation. Acc Chem Res 51, 1550-1557, 2018

Camponeschi, F., Ciofi-Baffoni, S., Banci, L. Anamorsin/Ndor1 Complex Reduces [2Fe-2S]-MitoNEET via a Transient Protein-Protein Interaction, J Am Chem Soc,  139: 9479–9482, 2017

Barbieri L, Luchinat E and Banci L. In-cell NMR spectroscopy in HEK293T cells: a protocol to characterize proteins in their physiological environment. Nature Protocols 11: 1101-1111,

Banci L, Ciofi-Baffoni S, Gajda K, Muzzioli R, Peruzzini R and Winkelmann J. N-terminal domains mediate [2Fe-2S] cluster transfer from glutaredoxin-3 to anamorsin. Nat Chem Biol 11: 772-778, 2015.

Banci L, Camponeschi F, Ciofi-Baffoni S and Muzzioli R. Elucidating the molecular function of human BOLA2 in GRX3-Dependent anamorsin maturation pathway. J Am Chem Soc 137: 16133-16134, 2015.

Banci L, Brancaccio D, Ciofi-Baffoni S, Del Conte R, Gadepalli R, Mikolajczyk M, Neri S, Piccioli M and Winkelmann J. [2Fe-2S] cluster transfer in iron-sulfur protein biogenesis, Natl.Acad.Sci.U.S.A, 111, 6203-6208, 2014.

Luchinat E, Barbieri L, Rubino J.T, Kozyreva T, Cantini F & Banci L. In-cell NMR reveals potential precursor of toxic species from SOD1 fALS mutants. Nature Commun. 5, 5502,

Banci L, Barbieri L, Bertini I, Luchinat E, Secci E, Zhao Y & Aricescu A.R. Atomic-resolution monitoring of protein maturation in live human cells by NMR. Nature Chem. Biol. 9, 297-299,

Scarselli M, Aricò B^*, Brunelli B, Savino S, Di Marcello F, Palumbo E, Veggi D, Ciucchi L, Cartocci E, Bottomley M.J, Malito E, Lo Surdo P, Comanducci M, Giuliani M.M, Cantini F, Dragonetti S, Colaprico A, Doro F, Giannetti P, Pallaoro M, Brogioni B, Tontini M, Hilleringmann M, Nardi-Dei V, Banci L, Pizza M. & Rappuoli R. Rational design of a meningococcal antigen inducing broad protective immunity. Science Transl Med. 3, 91ra62,

Banci L, Bertini I, Ciofi-Baffoni S, Kozyreva T, Zovo K & Palumaa P. Affinity gradients drive copper to cellular destinations. Nature 465, 645-648,

Complete list of publications