Big data and therapeutic molecules are the next level of treating complex diseases
Big data might mean big discoveries for the treatment of complex diseases. By harnessing the power of big data, Antonio Federico aims to discover novel therapeutic molecules and, ultimately, more effective therapies for patients. “The ultimate aim of my research activity is to improve patients’ lives,” he says.
Antonio Federico, a computational biologist originally from Italy first moved to Finland as a visiting PhD candidate in 2017. After falling in love with the country, its landscapes and culture, he stably moved to Finland. Currently Federico is enrolled as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Finnish Hub for Development and Validation of Integrated Approaches (FHAIVE), Faculty of Medicine and Health Technology (MET) at Tampere University and as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Tampere Institute for Advanced Studies.
During his career in research, Federico has devoted his activity to computational analyses of Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) data and systems biology modelling of human complex diseases.
Big data and therapeutic molecules
At Tampere University, Federico’s current research aims to discover novel therapeutic molecules for the treatment of human complex diseases.
– To achieve this, I integrate and exploit network medicine principles with the power of big data to evaluate the druggability of complex diseases, Federico explains.
By investigating altered molecular patterns underlying a certain disease, Federico aims to identify novel and more accurate disease subtypes, biomarkers, and drug targets, while discovering more efficient therapeutic molecules for the treatment of both curable and uncurable diseases.
– The ultimate aim of my research activity is to improve patients’ lives. It is exciting to know that the results of my research could one day be employed in clinical applications, Federico says.
Precision medicine means more effective therapies for patients
According to Federico, the main concern nowadays is to design patient-tailored therapeutic applications from drug discovery to the bedside.
– By identifying optimized compounds targeting disease vulnerabilities, I aim to define more effective therapies for patients. In this way, I will advance the field of drug discovery by exploiting large amounts of data in a novel framework at the interface of multiple disciplines and research fields. I hope that my results will pave the way to a sustainable transition from drug discovery to mechanistic drug design and that the novel solutions will lean towards patient-tailored clinical applications, Federico concludes.
Keywords: complex disease, big data, therapeutic molecules, precision medicine, Tampere University, Tampere Institute for Advanced Study