
Giulia Palermo is a computational biophysicist and a Professor at the University of California Riverside in the Department of Bioengineering and Chemistry. She is a native of Italy where she earned her Ph.D. in 2013 from the Italian Institute of Technology, studying in the lab of Dr. Marco De Vivo. During her doctoral studies, she was awarded an early career fellowship to join the group of Prof. Ursula Roethlisberger at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL). In 2016 she became a post-doc at the University of California San Diego (UCSD) working with Prof. J. Andrew McCammon, thanks to a Swiss National Science Foundation post-doctoral fellowship.
Her group is best known for pioneering computational studies of the CRISPR-Cas9 system. By applying and developing cutting-edge computer simulations and Artificial Intelligence (AI) approaches, the lab focuses on unraveling the mechanisms of action and engineering innovative genome editing systems that are revolutionizing the life sciences. She is a Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar and has received several prestigious honors, including the Corwin Hansch Award for Outstanding Scientists Under 40, the NSF CAREER Award, and the Sloan Research Fellowship in Chemistry.
Giulia is an active educator passionate about teaching. Her lab strives to create research opportunities to inspire students to excel in their scientific careers.
Honors and Awards
- 2024 – Rosetta Briegel Barton Lecturer, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK
- 2024 – Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar
- 2023 – The Rising Star Award of the Women Chemists Committee – American Chemical Society
- 2023 – Sloan Research Fellow in Chemistry
- 2023 – Biophysical Society Theory and Computation Subgroup Early Career Award
- 2022 – DOE-NERSC Innovative Use of High-Performance Computing Award
- 2022 – ERC Starting Grant
- 2022 – Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Advisor/Mentoring Award, UCR
- 2022 – NSF CAREER Award
- 2022 – ACS OpenEye Outstanding Junior Faculty Award in Computational Chemistry
- 2021 – Featured in the 2021 J. Am. Chem. Soc. Early Career Investigators Issue
- 2021 – First place prize at the 2021 RNA Society Arts and Music competition
- 2020 – Corwin Hansch Award for Outstanding Scientist Under 40
- 2018 – Featured in the 2018 J. Am. Chem. Soc. Early Career Investigators Issue
- 2018 – Nominated for the “Future of Biophysics Burroughs Wellcome Fund Symposium”
- 2017 – HPCwire Best Use of High-Performance Computing in Life Sciences
- 2017 – First place prize at the Art and Science image contest to the 61st Biophysical Society meeting, New Orleans.