Chemistry degree (Milan, It); PhD at the prestigious MRC-Laboratory of Molecular Biology (Cambridge, UK); Postdoc at Stanford School of Medicine (USA) with a long term EMBO fellowship. Luca Varani worked on RNA regulation of gene expression and RNA drug targeting during his PhD (Nat. Struc. Mol Biol, largest NMR structure at the time; PNAS, RNA in dementia). He moved to structural immunology during his postdoc (PNAS, TCR/pMHC). Since October 2007 he leads the Structural Biology group of the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (Bellinzona, CH). They strive to understand the molecular properties allowing a given antibody to eliminate a pathogen, using this information to select and engineer new antibodies. A highly multidisciplinary approach merges molecular and cellular biology, biophysics and computational simulations aimed at determining the structure and function of antibody-antigen complexes. Studies involve mainly rare and neglected diseases such as Dengue or Zika virus, Prion or rare form of Leukemias and, more recently, COVID-19. Last authorship for design and characterization of bispecific antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 (Nature), Zika (Cell) and Prion (Plos Path.), highly cited work describing the role of target affinity modulation in Chimeric Antigen Receptors (Mol. Therapy) and identifying the molecular events triggering prion neurodegeneration. Collaborative work to determine the antibody response to infection in Dengue (Cell Host and Microbe), Zika (Science), Malaria (Nat Med) and SARS-CoV-2 (Nat. Imm, Nat Comm) plus characterization of neutralizing antibodies in MERS (PNAS). Reviewer for high impact scientific journals (including Nature and Cells) and granting agencies, evaluator for EC start-up accelerator programs and consultant for antibody biotech and Pharma QC. Founder of CLBiotech (2022), a start-up focused on nanobody engineering