Report on the Insubria International Summer School on "Crystallography for Health and Biosciences"

The Insubria International Summer School on "Crystallography for Health and Biosciences", organized by the Research Group of Crystallography and Structural Chemistry of the University of Insubria, took place in the ancient Cloister of Sant'Abbondio in Como (Northern Italy). The event was attended by ca. 90 participants (nearly 70 young researchers, PhD students and post-doctoral scientists, originating from Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas (see the group photograph below). During the five intense days of the school, several among the most renowned scientists in their fields (14 invited speakers) have offered an advanced overview of the role of crystallography in frontier research topics, such as the pharmaceutical and biological fields and the characterization of nanomaterials for biomedical applications.

The scientific program, organized in morning and afternoon sessions, started with some introductory lectures presenting the fundamentals of matter-radiation interactions (P. Fornasini, University of Trento), the basics of structural crystallography (Hans-Beat Bürgi, University of Bern) and of conventional and synchrotron X-ray and neutron sources (P. Fornasini). All the other lessons were subdivided into three main topics: a) small molecules crystallography, with particular emphasis on the polymorphism of active pharmaceutical ingredients (J. Bernstein, University of Abu Dhabi), advanced structural methods from powder diffraction data (N. Masciocchi, University of Insubria) and forensic and patent litigation aspects related to drug formulation and process certification (W. Cabri, Sigma-Tau Rome); b) Nanoparticles for biomedical applications (diagnosis, drug delivery) and nanomaterials for tissues regeneration, (A. Cesaro, University of Trieste), and their experimental and computational characterization by advanced total scattering techniques (from powder diffraction experiments), like the Pair Distribution Function (P. Juhas, Columbia University, New York) and the Debye Function Approach (A. Cervellino, Paul Scherrer Institute, Villigen, and A. Guagliardi, Crystallography Institute, CNR, Bari) and by small angle x-ray scattering techniques (P. Laggner, Institute of Biophysiscs and Nanosystems Research, Graz); c) Structural crystallography of proteins and other biological macromolecules, from the experimental point of view (J. Helliwell, University of Manchester), to several computational aspects (H. Monaco, University of Verona, and I. Eberini, University of Milano), including data mining and validation of the results by other experimental methods (R. Berisio, Institute of Biostructure and Bioimaging, Napoli, and A. Pastore, National Institute for Medical Research, London).

A complete School Program is included in the report.

We also organized lunches all together to encourage the participants to further discuss among themselves and with the teachers. Accordingly, students, teachers and tutors fruitfully merged their ideas, skills and experiences throughout the whole school time. Finally, almost all teachers volunteered in writing several chapters for a nearly 300 pages book (in English), entitled "Crystallography for Health and Biosciences", jointly edited by Norberto Masciocchi (University of Insubria) and Antonietta Guagliardi (Istitute of Crystallography, Italian CNR), published by Insubria University Press and freely distributed to all school attendees. Spare copies of the book are now available at Insubria University Press (www.uninsubria.it/web/iup) at the nominal cost of 20 Euros.

The Scientific Committee included:

• Norberto Masciocchi, University of Insubria, Como, Italy (Chair)
• Roberto Accolla, University of Insubria, Varese, Italy
• Joel Bernstein, Ben Gurion University, Israel
• Simon Billinge, Columbia University, USA
• Hans-Beat Bürgi, University of Bern, Switzerland
• Simona Galli, University of Insubria, Como, Italy
• Antonietta Guagliardi, Istitute of Crystallography, CNR, Bari, Italy
• Hugo Monaco, University of Verona, Italy

• Simona Galli, University of Insubria, Como, Italy (Chair)
• Antonietta Guagliardi, Istitute of Crystallography, CNR, Bari, Italy
• Norberto Masciocchi, University of Insubria, Como, Italy
• Angelo Maspero, University of Insubria, Como, Italy
• Alessia Aprea, University of Insubria, Como, Italy
• Valentina Colombo, University of Insubria, Como, Italy
• Ruggero Frison, Istitute of Crystallography, CNR, Bari, Italy
• Giuseppe Cernuto, University of Insubria, Como, Italy (Webmaster)