Nicola Segata

Nicola Segata is a Full Professor at the Department of Cellular, Computational and Integrative Biology (CIBIO) at the University of Trento. His research focuses on microbiome analysis, computational genomics, and microbial ecology. He leads courses on Computational Microbial Genomics and Genomics, emphasizing genomic data analysis and precision medicine applications. His work involves exploring microbiome dynamics in health and disease, with particular attention to antibiotic resistance, maternal-infant transmission, and cancer microbiome signatures. Segata has pioneered methods like LEfSe for biomarker discovery and contributed to large-scale metagenomic studies across cohorts.

His research spans diverse environments—from human gut microbiota to food processing ecosystems—highlighting microbiome roles in nutrition, immunity, and disease. Collaborative projects include the ONCOBIOME network for cancer microbiome research and developing tools like PHLAME for phenotype prediction from metagenomes. Segata's lab also explores CRISPR-based editing tools derived from microbiome organisms, advancing synthetic biology applications. His work bridges computational methods with experimental validation, addressing translational challenges in microbiome science.

Teaching responsibilities include the 'Computational Microbial Genomics' and 'Genomics' modules within the Biologia Quantitativa e Computazionale program, alongside 'High Throughput Sequencing Data Analysis' for computer science students. Research highlights include defining gut microbiota signatures for colorectal cancer, elucidating diet-microbiome interactions, and advancing methodologies for metagenomic data analysis.