I graduated in Biological Sciences from UAB, Barcelona, in 1991 and earned a PhD from the same university in 1996. I then joined WF van Gunsteren’s lab at ETH Zurich, a leader in the field of computational biomolecular modeling and simulation, where we conducted pioneering research on polypeptide folding using molecular dynamics methods. In 2002, I became an ICREA Research Professor and returned to UAB’s Institute of Biotechnology and Biomedicine (IBB) to establish a Computational Biology group. My current research focuses mainly on developing strategies to combat multidrug-resistant bacterial infections through computational and experimental methods. Since 2005, I have been an Adjunct Professor at UAB's Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and, more recently, I have joined the CIBER-BBN from Instituto de Salud Carlos III. From 2011 to 2017, I served as Director of IBB and currently act as Academic Director of Bioinformatics Barcelona (BIB), a non-profit association.

The main objective of our research group is the development of new strategies to combat infections by multidrug-resistant (MDR) bacteria, in particular of the Gram-negative (GN) group. The increasing emergence and spread of MDR pathogens constitute at present one of the major threats to public health. The shortage of effective antimicrobials for the treatment of MDR GN infections is particularly critical as cases of pan-resistance are not uncommon. The discovery of new drug targets and modes of action (MoA), less prone to the development of resistance, has therefore become a pressing need. In parallel, the development of effective vaccines may offer a solution for high-risk population groups. Our team combines a range of computational and experimental techniques for the identification of antimicrobial-target candidates with new MoA and vaccine candidates eliciting prescribed responses. More recently, we have also started a research line on methodology for in silico clinical trials.