Assoc ProfessorAntonio Benedetto

Antonio Benedetto, born in Padua (Italy) in August 1984, is an experimental physicist with interest in biophysics and neutron scattering instrumentation. In 2011, he obtained his Ph.D. in Physics (University of Messina, Italy) defending a thesis on protein dynamics, which experimental component has been carried out at the Institute Laue-Langevin (Grenoble, France). His results confirmed the existence of a fragile-to-strong dynamical crossover in protein hydration water. In 2012, supported by an Individual Endeavour Research Fellowship of the Australian Government, he moved to “Oz”, joining the University of Sydney and the Bragg Institute. It was back at that time that he started to work on the development of a new neutron method for dynamics based on “elastic scattering”, which now is receiving the attention of few neutron large-scale facilities. Since 2013, supported by several individual fellowships and "starting"-type research grants (including two Marie-Curie fellowships) he has been carrying out his independent research activity at the University College Dublin (Ireland), the Paul Scherrer Institute (Switzerland), and the University Roma Tre (Italy). Since few years, the main focus of his research is the study of the interaction of ionic liquids with biomolecules and cells by means of neutron scattering, atomic force microscopy, computer simulations and few other complementary approaches. As an invited scientist, he regularly visits several of the largest neutron scattering facilities worldwide (i.e. ILL, ISIS, MLZ, NIST, SNS).