Current Medicinal Chemistry

William J. Hoekstra, Ph.D. serves as Vice President of Medicinal Chemistry at Viamet Pharmaceuticals Inc., Durham, NC, USA. He is the inventor of the Phase 2B antifungal oteseconazole and the Phase 2 anticancer agent seviteronel. Prior to working with Viamet, Dr. Hoekstra held the position of Associate Director in Discovery Medicinal Chemistry at GlaxoSmithKline where he coordinated the introduction of a group of nuclear receptor modulator programs into the portfolio. From 1991 to 2000, he directed the discovery and lead optimization of NCEs such as the Phase 2B antithrombotic elarofiban in Johnson & Johnson’s Department of Drug Discovery. He has co-authored over 100 publications, holds 40 U.S. patents, and has presented several invited lectures.

Dr. Wolf-Rainer Abraham is the head of Chemical Microbiology at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research in Braunschweig, Germany. He holds a Ph. D. in chemistry and has 40 years of experience in the discovery of bioactive natural products from microorganisms and plants. His focus is currently on multi-species biofilms and immune cells where he studies the impact of bioactive compounds on carbon flux in the cell using 13C-labeled compounds over time by isotope ratio mass spectrometry (IRMS). He published his results in more than 230 peer-reviewed articles and 12 patents.

Pier Giovanni Baraldi became a Full Professor of Medicinal Chemistry in 1987 at Bologna University and in 1992, he had moved to Ferrara University where he is now a Full Professor of Medicinal Chemistry. He has published more than 400 scientific papers including about 50 patents. He has participated in more than 90 Medicinal Chemistry meetings as a plenary speaker. His research interests have been focused on the design and synthesis of minor groove alkylating agents, combretastatin analogs, ligands for Adenosine Receptors, Cannabinoid Receptors, and Transient Receptor Potential channel modulators. He has several scientific collaborations with national and international pharmaceutical companies.

Prof. Marcus Tullius Scotti studied chemical engineering at Universidade de São Paulo (USP - São Paulo University) and finished his degree in 1999. He started to study specialization on industrial administration at University of São Paulo. From same university, in 2003 he did his post-graduation in organic chemistry, and finished his Master in 2005 and PhD in 2008. In January of 2009 he started to work as Professor of Organic Chemistry at Universidade Federal da Paraíba, Brazil. In 2014 he did his Pos-doc in cheminformatics at Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal. Currently he is Associate Professor of the Chemistry Department of the Universidade Federal da Paraíba. Prof. Marcus research interests are in the area of chemistry of the natural products, acting on the following subjects: Databases, Virtual Screening, QSAR, and chemotaxonomy using cheminformatics methods. Published 142 papers, 17 chapters book and 157 abstracts in conferences.

Stefano Bruno graduated in Pharmaceutical Chemistry and technology cum laude in 1998 from the University of Parma. He obtained a Ph.D. in Biochemical Sciences from the University of Torino. He was a research fellow at Oxford University from 2001 to 2004. He became a Researcher at the University of Parma in 2004 and Associate Professor in 2015. He has taken part in projects funded by the Italian Ministry for Research (MIUR), by the National Antarctic Research Program, by the US National Institute of Health and by the European Union.

Dr. Buehler is a pharmacologist and toxicologist in the Department of Pathology, University of Maryland School of Medicine. He has more than 15 years of experience as a regulatory researcher in the US FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. An important aspect of Dr. Buehler’s work is to identify ways to slow, reverse or prevent the effects of intra- and extravascular hemolysis induced pathobiology using plasma and recombinant constructs of haptoglobin, hemopexin and transferrin as well as identifying methods to upregulate these proteins in states of acute and chronic depletion.

Dr. Wei Chen received his Ph.D. from Inner Mongolia University, P.R. China in 2010. Currently, he is a full time Professor of Chengdu University of Traditional Chinese Medicine. His researches focused on Bioinformatics and Computational Biology. He has published over 110 peer-reviewed papers in SCI-indexed journals, and serving as Deputy Editor of Molecular Therapy-Nucleic Acids and reviewer of scientific journals such as Nucleic Acids Research, Bioinformatics, Briefings in Bioinformatics, etc . His publications have been cited over 7,600 times with H-index of 46 in Google Scholar (update in August 2019).

Dr. Salvatore Cuzzocrea is full Professor of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, University of Messina. He completed his graduation in Pharmacy and Medicine and became an Honorary Professor of Pharmacology in the University of Manchester (UK). Prof. Cuzzocrea has received a doctorate (PhD) in “Experimental Medicine” School of Medicine University of Messina. He has authored more than 600 publications including articles in peer reviewed international journals and scientific books. He has served as an Editor and referee for several international journals. He encompasses research activities with specific competences at international levels in the field of autoimmunity, inflammation and neurodegenerative disorders as well as drug development.

Dr. Ferroni obtained a Doctorate degree in Medicine and the Oncology Residency from the Sapienza University of Rome. She also holds a Ph.D. in Experimental Medicine from the same University. Currently, Dr. Ferroni is a Professor of Physiology and senior researcher at the San Raffaele Roma Open University, Italy. Her major scientific interest is in translational research and biospecimen sciences, with a particular focus on human cancer and the use and construction of innovative informatics platforms to improve health care organization and efficiency. Dr. Ferroni has authored more than 200 scientific publications.

Dr. Oreste Gualillo is Ph.D in Pharmacology. Since 2001, he is a SERGAS Researcher and the Head of the NEIRID (Neuroendocrine Interactions in Rheumatology and Inflammatory Diseases) group of IDIS (Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria de Santiago) at Santiago University Clinical Hospital . Dr. Gualillo’s primary research was focussed on cartilage pathophysiology and pharmacology. He contributed in defining the molecular signals triggered by adipokines in rheumatic diseases and in the inflammatory response. Dr. Gualillo’s track record of professional achievement is supported by more than 150 primary peer-reviewed publications. He has served as an editorial board member for several scientific journals and committes.

Dr. Kotra is an academic entrepreneur with expertise in drug discovery and development. He is a senior scientist at University Health Network, and an Associate Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at University of Toronto. Dr. Kotra received his Ph.D. in pharmacy from the University of Georgia and postdoctoral training at Wayne State University. Dr. Kotra authored/co-authored 117 original research manuscripts, review articles and book chapters and several patents. Dr. Kotra has contributed to a number of drug discovery and drug delivery projects including anti-HIV drugs, antibacterials, insulin, interferon mimetics, protein-drug conjugates (cancer), antimalarials, drugs targeting multiple sclerosis and thrombocytopenia.

Dr. Li obtained his PhD in chemistry from Columbia University, and currently he is a Professor and the Faculty Director of Shared Instrument Faculty in College of Pharmacy, the University of Tennessee Health Science Center. He has close to 20 years of experience in small molecule drug discovery for cancer and inflammation. Dr. Li has published more than 120 papers, is an inventor of four issued US patents, and is a frequent grant reviewer for NIH and other government agencies.

Dr. Mehran F. Moghaddam obtained his PhD in medicinal chemistry at the Oregon State University-School of Pharmacy and investigated novel lipid metabolism at the University of California-Davis as a postdoctoral researcher. He also completed an executive MBA at the University of Southern California. He started his industrial career by joining DuPont in 1995. Subsequently, he worked in Pfizer and Celgene. He is currently the head of Discovery Drug Metabolism and Pharmacokinetics (DMPK) at Celgene, a global biopharmaceutical company with marketed blockbuster drugs in oncology and anti-inflammatory spaces. Dr. Moghaddam is a co-inventor of more than 5 patents. He has authored/co-authored more than 50 manuscripts on a variety of subject matters. He is on the editorial board of Drug Metabolism Letters and DARU. Additionally, he is a Section Editor of Current Medicinal Chemistry.

Dr. Mozzarelli is a Full Professor in Biochemistry, University of Parma, Parma and the Vice Director of the Interdepartmental Center for Food Safety, Innovation and Technology (SITEIA.PARMA), Parma Technopole. He is serving as a Coordinator of the Protein Group of the Italian Biochemical Society. He has served more than forty years in the field of Protein Sciences. His investigations are aimed at understanding of the structure-dynamics-function-regulation relationships for heme-containing proteins and coenzyme-containing enzymes, strategies for protein encapsulation, complementary experimental and computational approaches for drug discovery, development of haemoglobin-based blood substitutes, and application of proteomics to food characterization. He has authored more than 180 papers and three patents, with an H-index of 37.

Dr. Ling Peng is a Research Director at the French National Scientific Research Center (CNRS) and a group leader at the Interdisciplinary Center on Nanoscience in Marseille (CINaM). She is working actively in developing multifunctional dendrimers as intelligent nanomaterials for drug and gene delivery, molecular probes for exploring biological events and drug discovery. Dr. Ling Peng has co-authored more than 100 scientific papers, 5 patents and 15 book chapters.

Dr. Giovanni Tarantino, MD, was Born in Avellino (Italy) on September 23, 1946. He received his degree from the Medical School of Naples in 1970. He is a specialist in Internal Medicine, Endocrinology and Metabolic Diseases. He served as a Past Chief of the outpatients clinic of the Department of Medicine for liver diseases at the Medical School of Federico II University, Naples, Past Adjunct Professor of Internal Medicine and currently, he is affiliated to the Department of Clinical Medicine of Federico II University as expert in the field of Hepatology and performs senior investigation in the area of NAFLD.

Dr. Andrés Trostchansky obtained his Ph.D. in Chemistry at the Universidad de la Republica, Uruguay in 2007. Since 2010 he is an Associate Professor at the Department of Biochemistry at the Facultad de Medicina. He is Co-PI of the Laboratory of Oxidative Lipid Biochemistry and a member of the Centro de Investigaciones Biomedicas (CEINBIO). Dr. Trostchanksy’s main research is focussed on lipid metabolism and lipidomics studies in health and disease. Also, he is involved in nitro-fatty acids biological roles mainly at arachidonic acid metabolism (COX and LOX) and reactive oxygen species (NOX, PDI). He served as a mentor of Ph.D. students in Uruguay and Brazil. He has authored/co-authored more than 50 manuscripts and book chapters on a variety of subject matters. He is on the editorial board of Frontiers of Experimental Pharmacology and Drug Discovery, Current Drug Target, and he is a Section Editor of Current Medicinal Chemistry.

Prof. Dr. Xue-Qiang Zha received B.Sc. degree from Anhui Agricultural University in 2001 and Ph.D. degree from Hefei University of Technology in 2007. From 2010 to 2011, he acted as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Puerto Rico. His research focuses on the medicinal ingredients in foods and Traditional Chinese Medicine, including their high efficient purification technology, structural identification, and mechanism of bioactivity.

James Adams received his PhD in Pharmacology from the University of California San Francisco. He has been a Professor at the University of Southern California School of Pharmacy for 28 years, where he teaches Pharmacy, Medical and Graduate Students. He has over 250 publications in journals and books. His current area of interest is California medicinal plants. Dr. Adams was trained in Chumash Indian Healing for 14 years by a recognized Chumash Healer. Since 2012, he has become a Healer to the Chumash people of the San Fernando Valley. He has written a book and several articles on Chumash Healing. He continues to teach Chumash Healing to healthcare students and the public.

Prof. Rosa Amoroso completed her Master’s Degree in Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Technology (CTF) at the University of Bologna, submitting a thesis in Pharmaceutical Analysis, in 1989. She received her PhD at the Department of Chemistry “G. Ciamician” in Bologna, carrying out a study on asymmetric synthesis of amino acids. In 1994, she got a position as a Research Associate and since 2001 she is an Associate Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the Department of Pharmacy of the University “G. d’Annunzio”, Chieti, Italy. Prof. Amoroso has consolidated experience in the synthesis of molecules of pharmaceutical interest, with knowledge of the various synthetic and analytical approaches aimed at obtaining high purity products. The main research topics are inhibitors of Nitric Oxide Synthases and modulators of the PPARs receptors.

Dr. Firoz Anwar did B. Pharm from Luqman College of Pharmacy, Gulbarga, Karnataka, India in 1996. Later, he did Ph.D. Pharmacy, Jadavpur University, India in 2002. Since 2015, he is a Professor at Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Science, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah.

Giorgio Ascoli is a University Professor at the George Mason University (Virginia, USA) and founding director of the Center for Neural Informatics. Dr. Ascoli received a Ph.D in Chemistry from the Scuola Normale Superiore of Pisa, Italy, studying proteins involved in learning and neurodegeneration. He won the European Phillips Young Investigator Award in 1989 for synthesizing a new organic molecule and moved to NIH in 1994. Ascoli is internationally recognized in computational neuroanatomy and is the founding Editor-in-Chief of the journal Neuroinformatics. He created and curates NeuroMorpho.Org (collection of digitally reconstructed neurons), and Hippocampome.Org (knowledge based on hippocampal neuron types). His book “Trees of the Brain, Roots of the Mind” has been published by MIT Press in 2015.

Dr. Baell is a research-only Professor in Medicinal Chemistry at the Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Monash University. He is also a Director of the Australian Translational Medicinal Chemistry Facility. He is an Australian National Award-winning medicinal chemist with a battery of medicinal discoveries with 40 granted patents and more than 100 publications inclusive of Nature, Nature Chemical Biology and frequently in Journal of Medicinal Chemistry. His research interests include high throughput screening library design, hit-to-lead medicinal chemistry, infectious and neglected diseases, epigenetic modifiers, and peptidomimetic design and synthesis. He was the principal architect for Australia’s 370,000 small molecule HTS library. As of 2016, his 2010 PAINS publication in the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry has already been cited more than 500 times. Dr Baell is also the co-Senior Editor of Future Medicinal Chemistry and Editorial Advisory Board member for Biology as well as Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, and Review Editor for Frontiers in Chemical Biology. He is a founding Director of the International Chemical Biology Society, and currently he is the Secretary. He is a Scientific Advisory Board member for TopoGEN Inc. (Colorado) and Regen Biopharma Inc. (San Diego).

Daniela Barlocco earned her degree in Pharmacy (1969) and in Chemistry (1977) from the University of Pavia (Italy). She became Researcher at the University of Milan, faculty of Pharmacy, in 1980 and Associate Professor at the University of Modena in 1992. She got the title of full Professor at the University of Milan in 2000. Her main research interests are the designing of small molecules as enzyme inhibitors and the comprehension of the protein-protein interactions. She has published about 150 scientific papers and several patents. She is on the Advisory Board of several journals.

Dr. Beretta is an Assistant Researcher at the Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale Tumori of Milan. Dr. Beretta obtained a degree in Biology at the University of Milan, a Ph.D in Biochemistry and Clinical Chemistry, and a Master in Oncology Pharmacy and Pharmacology. Among the fields of interest of Dr. Beretta are the molecular and biochemical pharmacology of antitumor agents and the strategies to overcome drug resistance. Dr. Beretta has experience in preclinical and translational studies and has participated in the development of novel antitumor drugs and of nanovectors for nucleic acids delivery. Dr. Beretta has authored 71 papers and book chapters.

Dr. Bharate obtained B.Pharm. from the University of Pune, and then he received M.S.Pharm and PhD degree from NIPER-Mohali (India). He has industrial experience (Dr. Reddy's Lab, Piramal Life Sciences) and has done postdoctoral studies at University of Montana (USA) in the area of neuroscience. Presently, he is working as a Principal Scientist in the Medicinal Chemistry Division of CSIR-Indian Institute of Integrative Medicine. His current research interests are in the field of medicinal chemistry of natural products to discover new therapeutics for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease and cancer. He is recipient of several innocentive awards, and three young scientist awards (NASI, CSIR, OPPI). He is a reviewer for various international journals. He has published 136 papers and has 17 patents on his credit.

A Graduate Research Professor Emeritus (active) at the University of Florida, Dr. Bodor has published more than 520 research articles and holds over 250 patents. The soft steroid Loteprednol Etabonate, designed by Dr. Bodor based on his retrometabolic concepts, is on the worldwide market. He is elected fellow of AAPS, APhA, AAAS and AACP, other honors include election to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences; the Volwiler Award and the AAPS Distinguished Pharmaceutical Scientist Award. He is a member of the American Chemical Society’s Hall of Fame, and founded Bodor Laboratories in 2006 in order to further develop his drug design strategies.

Przemyslaw Bozko received his Ph.D. from the Faculty of Chemistry, Technical University of Gdansk, Poland. He is the Lab head of the Dept. Internal Medicine at Tübingen University Hospital, Tübingen, Germany since 2012. His research interests include interactions between tumor suppressors and oncogenes, during both tumor, formation and anticancer therapy and infection biology. Besides, he has published several articles in well-reputed journals.

Emeritus Professor John Bremner holds a PhD in Organic Chemistry from the Australian National University, Canberra. He was a former Professor of Organic Chemistry in the School of Chemistry, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, Australia. His research interests cover heterocyclic and medicinal chemistry, including the design and development of new anti-bacterial agents. He has more than 220 scientific publications, and served as an Editorial Board member of a number of journals.

Jean Michel Brunel was graduated from the School of Chemistry of Marseille (France) in 1991. He obtained his Ph.D. degree in 1994 from Université Aix Marseille in the field of asymmetric organophosphorus chemistry. In 1994, he joined the group of Pr. H. B. Kagan (Université Paris Sud) as a postdoctoral fellow working on the enantioselective catalytic oxidation of sulfides. In 1997, he joined the CNRS as Chargé de Recherche and is now working at the Centre de Recherche en Cancérologie de Marseille. His research program is focused on the development of novel classes of antimicrobial and anticancer agents.

Terrence Burke received his Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry from the University of Washington (Seattle) and has spent most of his professional career within the Intramural Program of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). He is currently a Senior Investigator at the Chemical Biology Laboratory (National Cancer Institute). He has published more than 300 scientific publications and is a co-inventor of 20 issued U.S. patents.

Loredana Cappellacci is Associate Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the School of Pharmacy, University of Camerino, since 2007. In 1998, she spent one year as Visiting Scientist at Southern Research Institute in Birmingham, Alabama, USA. She is author of more than 90 papers published in leading international peer-review journals, 2 International Patents and 2 book chapters. Her main research interests are on design, synthesis and characterization of small molecules as: a) enzyme inhibitors (as anticancer, antibacterial, antiparasitic, and antiviral agents), b) adenosine receptor ligands. More recently, a topic of research is also the characterization and biological evaluation of essential oils and extracts from plants from different countries.

Gaetano Caramori is working as Full Professor of Respiratory Diseases at the University of Messina (Italy, www.unime.it) and he is Head of the Pulmonology Unit, at the University Hospital of Messina (Italy, www.polime.it) and he is the Coordinator of the Specialisation School in Respiratory Medicine and of the International PhD on Translational Molecular Medicine and Surgery (Italy, www.unime.it) . He has been awarded the title of Fellow of the European Respiratory Society (FERS). His H index is 47 (www.scopus.com), with >160 scientific publications

Alessia Carocci graduated in Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Technology, summa cum laude, at the University of Bari in 1992. She received a Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry from the same University, in 1998. A post-doctoral position and a research grant in Medicinal Chemistry were held between 1999 and 2001. Since 2002, she was a researcher and since 2017 she is an associate professor of medicinal chemistry at the department of Pharmacy-Drug Sciences of the University of Bari. She is a member of the Ph.D. school and the Italian Chemical Society. She is author of more than 65 papers and reviews in high IF peer-review international journals and 6 chapters in books. She regularly serves as a reviewer for several international scientific journals. Her research interests regard the synthesis of biologically active compounds in the field of antimitotic, antiarrhythmic, antitumor, antibacterial and melatonergic drugs.

Alessia Catalano graduated in Pharmacy (University of Bari), with maximum vote and honor in 1994 and received her Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry in 1998. She became researcher in 2002 and Associate Professor in 2017. She is author of more than 60 papers published in leading international peer-review journals, in addition to book chapters and poster and oral presentations. She is a peer reviewer for international journals. Her main research interests are the synthesis and evaluation of structure-activity relationships of biologically active compounds: antiarrhythmics, antimyotonics, antihypertensives, antimicrobials and antitumor agents. She is member of the Teaching Committee for Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences.

Guido Cavaletti graduated in Medicine at the University of Milan in 1984, and specialized in Neurology in 1989. In 1990, he obtained a clinical position at the Department of Neurology of the S. Gerardo Hospital in Monza. Since 2001, he is a Professor of Human Anatomy at the School of Medicine of the University of Milan-Bicocca, where he is the coordinator of the PhD program in Neuroscience and head of the Experimental Neurology Unit. He is a member of the Italian Society of Neurology, of the Peripheral Nerve Society, of the Italian Society for neuro-Immunology and past-president of the Italian Peripheral Nerve Association. He coordinates the activity of the European/US/Australia CI-PeriNomS group on the standardization of outcome measures in Chemotherapy-Induced Peripheral Neurotoxicity. He authored more than 230 papers in the international peer-reviewed journals.

Dr. Chiba is a professor, senior scientist and lecturer at the Medical University of Vienna. He is a doctorate in Medicine from the University of Vienna and conducted research at the Universities of South Florida and Nijmegen (The Netherlands) as a Fulbright scholar and post-doctoral associate. His research focuses on the functional biology of ABC transporters and their role in drug disposition and in the etiology of human diseases. He authored more than 100 manuscripts and co-edited “Transporters as drug carriers”. Dr. Chiba recently initiated an academic program dedicated to the development of antiparasitic drugs.

Dr. E. Cichero obtained the degree in Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Technologies in 2005 at the University of Genoa while in 2009 she received her Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences. From 2014 she is Assistant Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Genoa. From more than ten years she has expertise in molecular modeling and computational chemistry strategies applied to medicinal chemistry. Her research topics include the development of compounds targeting GPCRs, such as cannabinoid receptors and trace-amine associated receptors as well as of drug-like molecules for the treatment of cystic fibrosis. She has authored 60 papers and numerous poster communications.

Prof. Costantino became a researcher of the Dipartimento di Scienze Farmaceutiche of Modena and RE University (Italy) in 1983, and associate Professor of Medicinal Chemistry in 1998. He has authored more than 100 articles, three patents and several book chapters dealing with Medicinal Chemistry. Recently, his research activity addressed the synthesis of new antiparasitic (protozoa, Mycobacterium tuberculosis) and antitumor compounds, as well as the design of targeted nanoparticles as drug carriers for CNS and for alveolar macrophages. Prof. Costantino is a member of the council of the PhD School “Clinical and Experimental Medicine” at Modena University.

Dr. Sunliang Cui is a professor in College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Zhejiang University. He got the Ph.D degree in Zhejiang University, and then worked as postdoc in Colorado University and University of South Florida. He started his independent research in 2012. He has 15 years of experience in the research of organic synthesis, medicinal chemistry and drug discovery. He has authored more than 40 manuscripts and 10 patents, and currently he is focusing on the drug discovery of antineoplastics and antiepileptics.

Dr. Russell Dahl is the CEO and founder of Neurodon Corporation, a pharmaceutical company developing novel small molecules for diabetes and neurodegeneration. He previously led all small molecule research at Celladon Corp., where he was responsible for progressing a diverse pipeline into the clinic. He started his career in industry at Agouron Pharmaceuticals and progressed through positions of increasing responsibility at DuPont Pharmaceuticals, BMS, Vertex, and Kemia. Russell has been involved in many successful biotech startups and regularly serves as an advisor and consultant. His experience spans all phases of drug discovery and development and he has contributed to several IND filings, clinical candidates, and regulatory approvals. Russell has co- authored over 90 scientific publications and is an inventor on over 50 patents and applications. He is a former Professor of Neuroscience and Medicinal Chemistry. Russell received his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of California, San Diego as a DuPont Fellow, and he has additional training in molecular pharmacology from Stanford University.

Dr. De Filippis is an Associate Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Padua, Italy, and has received the National Academic Qualification as Full Professor in General Biochemistry. His main scientific projects entail the development of novel anticoagulants and the study of the molecular mechanisms linking inflammation, oxidative stress and sepsis to thrombotic diseases. Dr. De Filippis authored more than 80 publication in peer reviewed Journals (total IF: 300; H-index: 24) and three international patents. Dr. De Filippis is also the Vice-Chair of the Degree Course in the Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Technologies, University of Padua.

Dr. Roberto Di Santo is Full Professor of Medicinal Chemistry, School Pharmacy and Medicine, “Sapienza” University of Rome Italy, and Vice-President of the Medicinal Chemistry Division of the Italian Chemical Society. He holds Master degrees in Chemistry and in Pharmacy at “Sapienza” University of Rome. Prof. Di Santo research is focused primarily on drug design and synthesis of new molecular entities endowed with biological activities. He devoted particular efforts in the discovery of antimicrobial and antitumor agents. Most part of scientific activity is focused on compounds active against HIV targets like integrase, ribonuclease H and polymerase functions of the reverse transcriptase, and protease. He is an author or co-author of books and over 130 publications and patents. Prof. Di Santo is an active member of EFMC and SCI.

Prof. Dr. Mehmet Emin Duru, received his PhD in Organic Chemistry from the Ataturk University, Turkey. Currently, he is a Professor at Mugla Sitki Kocman University, Deparment of Chemistry, Turkey. He has over 100 publications in journals and books. His main research interests are the natural product chemistry, particularly; medicinal mushrooms and plants with their bioactivities (antioxidant, anticholinesterase, anti-inflammatory, anti- urease, anti-tyrosinase). And also he has focused on, isolation and characterization of the bioactive compounds from medicinal mushrooms and plants on publications.

Sergey A. Dyshlovoy, PhD, D.Sc., trained in chemistry, biochemistry and molecular biology in the Russian Federation and in Germany. He started his scientific career in 2006. Between 2009- 2012 he did his PhD in chemistry, focussing on elucidation of structure, and mode of action of novel small-molecule marine bioactive compounds showing anticancer activity in the in G.B. Elyakov Pacific Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry (PIBOC, Vladivostok, Russian Federation). In 2019 he did his Habilitation in the same institute. Since 2012, he was a senior scientist in both PIBOC, as well as in the Far Eastern Federal University (Vladivostok), since 2019, he is a senior scientist in the Laboratory of Pharmacology, A.V. Zhirmunski National Scientific Center of Marine Biology (Vladivostok). Since 2013, he works as a post-doctoral researcher at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (Hamburg, Germany) in the Department of Oncology. Since 2014, he is a member of the Commission of Experts of the Russian Scientific Foundation.

Professor Dr. Prof. h. c. mult. Thomas Efferth is chair of the Department of Pharmaceutical Biology, Institute of Pharmacy and Biochemistry, Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz, Germany. He is honorary professor at the Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, and at the Zhejiang Chinese Medical University, Hangzhou, China. Moreover, he is visiting professor at the Zhejiang University of Science and Technology, Hangzhou, China. Thomas Efferth has published >450 papers (Hirsch-factor: 60; citation rate: >15,000. His research topics are n tumor pharmacology and pharmacogenomics with a special focus on chemical entities from natural sources .

Dr. Eichmüller holds a Ph.D. in Biology from the Free University of Berlin. After his Habilitation (venia legendi) at the Medical Faculty Mannheim he became adjunct professor at the University of Heidelberg, teaching tumor immunology. Dr. Eichmüller is the head of the GMP & T Cell Therapy Unit at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg. He has more than 20 years of experience in research on tumor immunology and, more recently, miRNA. He has published more than 80 papers in high ranking journals. Moreover, Dr. Eichmüller is the head of a GMP facility at DKFZ and serves as a Qualified Professional for the production of autologous, tumor-specific T cells for the treatment of cancer patients.

Dr. Eritja is a Research Professor at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) leading the Nucleic Acids Chemistry Research Group at the Institute for Advanced Chemistry of Catalonia (IQAC). He has more than 30 years of experience in research on DNA and RNA synthesis. Previously, he was group leader at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine of Barcelona and the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) at Heidelberg, Germany. Dr. Eritja holds a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry, specializing in peptide chemistry. Dr. Eritja is coauthor of more than 300 papers, 15 patents and several book chapters.

Dr. Roberta Ettari is an Associate Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Messina. She is working in the field of protease inhibitors as antiparasitic or anticancer agents. In 2007, she received her Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of Messina. She had various experiences as a postdoctoral researcher: Galway University (2008), Messina University (2010-2011), Milan University (2012-2014). In 2011, she received the “Farmindustria Award for Excellence in Medicinal Chemistry Research. She also spent some research periods as a guest scientist at Merck Research Laboratories (Pomezia), Instituto Grifols (Barcelona), Würzburg and Mainz Universities (Germany).

Since 1991, Prof. Caterina Faggio is a Senior Researcher at the Department of Chemical, Biological, Pharmaceutical and Environmental Sciences-University of Messina, Italy. Her research topics encompass different research fields: effects of environmental contaminants and food additives on salt transports in teleost intestine; cell volume regulation and cytotoxicity in fish intestine, hepatocytes and digestive cell of mussels by the videometric method; mechanisms responsible for the eryptosis (apoptosis of human red blood cells); haematological and serological parameters in seawater teleosts that dwell in different habitats: lake, sea and fish farm; oxidative stress markers and health status in non-target aquatic organisms. She has numerous publications in prestigious international journals. Moreover, she is the President of Messina Section (SIBS), Italian Society of Experimental Biology. She performs referee activity for prestigious international journals.

Stephanie Federico is an Assistant Professor in Medicinal Chemistry at the Department of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences of the University of Trieste. Her main research interests are focused on design, synthesis and characterization of heterocyclic compounds as ligands for specific target proteins. In particular, she has experience in the development of antagonists for adenosine receptors as also inhibitors of enzymes such as nucleotidases and kinases.

Dr. Fiore is a researcher at the Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology of the Italian National Research Council IBBC- CNR. He graduated in Natural Sciences and in Biological Sciences from the Sapienza University of Rome, Italy. He received his PhD in Medical Sciences from the Psychiatric Department of the University of Groningen, The Netherlands. Dr. Fiore Potentiated his professional experience at the Institute of Zoology, Oxford University, UK and at the Department of Physiology and Behavior, the University of California at Davis, CA-USA.

Prof. Dr. Galanski received a doctorate (Ph.D.) in Chemistry from the University of Heidelberg, Germany. He holds the position of Associate Professor at the Institute of Inorganic Chemistry of the University of Vienna, Austria. Dr. Galanski has (co)authored more than 150 publications in the field of bioinorganic chemistry with focus on the development of platinum-based anticancer drugs.

Professor Sobhi Mohammed Gomha graduated from Cairo University, Egypt in 1995. He further carried out his M.Sc and PhD studies in 2002 and 2006 respectively. In 2011, he promoted to Associate Professor and in 2016 he was appointed as a full Professor of Organic chemistry at Cairo University. He joined the scientific school of Prof. A. S. Shawali in 1996 and he has published 152 scientific papers (145 research paper + 7 review articles) in international journals in the fields of synthetic organic chemistry.

Prof. Grassi is Associate professor in Clinical Biochemistry in the Department of Life Sciences of the University of Trieste, Italy; in 2014 he has became full professor. Prof Grassi has 25-years of experience in molecular biology and drug release. He authored 100 papers, 11 books/book chapters and 3 patents. He has been a Visiting Fellow in N.I.H, USA and Scientist Assistant in the University of Tuebingen, Germany. At present, he teaches “Clinical Biochemistry” in the Medical degree course and “Molecular Diagnostic” in the Medical Biotechnology degree course of the University of Trieste. He has also been president of the Master degree in Medical Biotechnology, University of Trieste.

Cesare Gridelli, MD, is currently Chief of Division of Medical Oncology and Director of Department of Hematology-Oncology at the “S.G. Moscati” Hospital, Avellino (Italy). His areas of expertise are lung cancer and cancer in the elderly. He is deeply involved in the clinical development of new anticancer targeted therapies and immunotherapy. He is the President of the Italian Association of Thoracic Oncology (AIOT). He is the author or co-author of more than 750 papers, of which more than 370 extended papers published in international indexed journals, and as several book chapters. His papers have about 16.378 citations on international indexed journals. Dr. Gridelli has an h-index of 62. On November 2013 the American agency Expertscape (Palo Alto, California) appointed Dr. Gridelli as the top most world experts on lung cancer.

Dr. Clara Grosso earned her degree in Plant Biology from the Faculty of Sciences, University of Lisbon (2004) and a PhD degree in Biotechnology from the School of Engineering, University of Lisbon (2010). Since 2015, she has been an assistant researcher at REQUIMTE/ LAQV/Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto. Her field of research focuses on natural products, regarding aspects like extraction and identification of secondary metabolites and assessment of in vitro bioactivities with emphasis for oxidative stress and enzymes related with Alzheimer’s disease and depression. She is also interested in strategies to deliver drugs into the brain She is a reviewer for scientific journals and author of several papers and chapters in the areas of natural products, nanomedicine and neurosciences. She is also the editor of a book published by Springer, entitled "Herbal Medicine in Depression: Traditional Medicine to Innovative Drug Delivery” (2016).

Dr. Guerrero received his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Barcelona. He has been serving at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) in Barcelona and is currently the Professor of Research and leader of the Chemical Ecology Unit. He has also served as the Head of the Department of Biological Organic Chemistry at the Institute of Advanced Chemistry of Catalonia (CSIC), and as the Councilor of the International Society of Chemical Ecology. He has published more than 180 papers, and is the author or coauthor of 7 patents. He has been serving as a reviewer for a number of national and international funding agencies.

Isabel Haro is a Research Scientist of CSIC working at the Institute of Advanced Chemistry in Catalonia. She obtained her Chemistry Degree from the University of Barcelona in 1982 and completed her Masters in Science at the Department of Biochemistry from the same University. In 1985 she moved to the Peptides’ Laboratory of CSIC and completed her PhD in 1988. After a post-doctoral training of two years spent between the CSIC in Barcelona and the Royal Free Hospital in London, she gained a permanent position in the CSIC, in 1990. Since then, she has been working on the use of synthetic peptides in the field of Biomedicine and has published more than 170 articles, 8 reviews, 30 chapters of books and 8 patents. However, she has been the Principal Researcher of 15 research projects and 3 contracts with the industry and has also supervised 12 doctoral theses.

After his PhD (1995), Dr Heymann successively was appointed as technician, engineer at the Nantes Hospital (FR), Associate-Professor (2001) and Professor of Histology and Embryology at the University of Nantes (2009). He heads an Inserm research laboratory studying the pathogenesis of bone sarcomas. He has authored more than 220 peer-reviewed publications. Since September 2015, He was the personal Chair of Bone Oncology at the University of Sheffield (UK) where he serves as head of a European Associated Laboratory (Sarcoma Research Unit) Inserm/Univ. Sheffield/Univ. Nantes.

Prof. Hoffmann was born in Salzburg (Austria) and received his academic degrees from the University of Innsbruck (major: chemistry; doctoral thesis at the Institute of Molecular Biology of the Austrian Academy of Sciences). He was postdoctoral fellow at ZymoGenetics Inc. (Seattle, WA) and later on junior group leader at the Max-Planck-Institute for Psychiatry (Martinsried, Germany). In 1993, he accepted a call as Professor of Medicinal Chemistry and Head of the Institute of Molecular Biology and Medicinal Chemistry at the Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg (Medical Faculty). Prof. Hoffmann has authored more than 100 publications. His current scientific interests focus on protection, regeneration and repair mechanisms of mucous epithelia and their glands with special emphasis on the role of TFF peptides. Further topics are TFF peptides in the immune and central nervous systems.

Dr. Honek is a Professor in the Department of Chemistry, University of Waterloo, Canada. He received his B.Sc. /Ph.D. degrees at the McGill University. His Ph.D. research (supervisor: Dr. Bernard Belleau), focused on the design and synthesis of sulfur-based heterocyclic analogs of the anthracycline antibiotics. Postdoctoral research (MIT; supervisor: Dr. Christopher Walsh) explored the enzyme mechanisms involved in microbial methane production. Dr. Honek’s research is focused on the biological chemistry of the carbon-sulfur bond and on protein structure and function. He is the author of numerous publications including a recent textbook (Biochemical Pharmacology by Palmer, Chan, Dieckmann & Honek, (2012) Wiley-VCH). He is the recipient of the Canadian Society for Chemistry Bernard Belleau Award (2014) for distinguished contributions to the field of medicinal chemistry.

Dr. Seyed Jalal Hosseinimehr obtained PhD in Radiopharmacy in 2002 from Tehran University of Medical Sciences. He is presently serving as a Professor at the Department of Radiopharmacy in Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences. His Research experiences include Radiation Biology, Radio protective study in animal, Tumor bearing mice, Radiopharmaceuticals and cell culture. He has been recognized with several awards and honors such as Prize for top PhD student, Prize for top researcher, and others. He has contributed more than 170 publications, having citations around 2,958.

Prof. Dr. Jamshed Iqbal (Tamgha-i-Imtiaz), FRSC is the Head of Pakistan’s finest drug research center CADR at COMSATS University, Abbottabad Campus since 2013. He has completed his early education from Pakistan, while his MS and PhD degree was from University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK and University of Bonn, Germany, respectively. After doing 2 Postdocs from Germany and China, he opted to serve Pakistan and joined Department of Pharmacy, CUI, Abbottabad Campus. He has innovatory contributions in Pharmaceutical/Chemical sciences. Prof. Iqbal has more than 190 publications (Impact factor >550) in several top international journals and 2 international patents. In 2017, Prof. Iqbal has been awarded PAS-Gold Medal by Pakistan Academy of Sciences.

Dr. Jelkmann is the Director of the Institute of Physiology at the University of Luebeck (http://www.physio.uni-luebeck.de/). He received his medical degree in Hannover, Germany. After fellowships in Regensburg, New Orleans (Tulane) and Luebeck, he became a Professor of Physiology in Bonn before he moved to Luebeck in 1995. His research has focused on erythropoietin and other hematopoietic growth factors. He has authored more than150 original publications more than 130 review articles/book chapters and has edited 5 books.

Prof. Guoyin Kai obtained his PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Shanghai Jiaotong University, China (2005). He worked as a visiting scholar in Brookhaven National Laboratory in USA (2012-2013). He currently working as Professor, Zhejiang Chinese Medical University, China. Previously worked as associate Professor (2005-2012) and Professor (2012-2017) in Shanghai Normal University, China (2005-2017). Prof. Dr. Kai had more than 100 scientific publications including Metab Eng, Crit Rev Food Sci Nutr, Trends Food Sci Tech, Food Chem, J Agr Food Chem, Food Chem Toxicol, J Exp Bot and PNAS etc. His research mainly focused on phytomedicine, natural product and functional food.

Dr. Kalász is a Senior Scientific Adviser in the Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapy at Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary. Previously, he worked at Yale University and was a Visiting Professor in University of Cincinnati and United Arab Emirates University. He earned his PhD at the Kossuth Lajos University, Debrecen, Hungary; he was awarded the title of doctor of chemical sciences by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and obtained his medical habilitation in pharmacology at Semmelweis University. He has authored over 250 papers. His activity covers analytical and preparative scale separations, distribution of drugs in the body and development of novel instrumentation.

Professor Matthew Kiernan is the Co-Director of the Brain and Mind Centre - Discovery and Translation. His role is to foster multidisciplinary research across the clinical neurosciences, to improve research outcomes and facilitate the translation of research innovations directly into clinical practice for the benefit of patients and the community Professor Matthew Kiernan is the Bushell Chair of Neurology at the University of Sydney. He is a Professor of Neurology and Staff Specialist at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital. He is also a Senior Scientist at Neuroscience Research Australia.

Dr. Kratz is a medicinal chemist with more than 25 years of pertinent experience in the preclinical development of anticancer prodrugs and protein conjugation chemistry. He has successfully transferred aldoxorubicin, CytRx clinical lead compound, from bench to bedside that is based on an innovative drug delivery platform exploiting circulating albumin as an endogenous drug carrier. He serves as an Editorial Board member for Bioconjugate Chemistry, Current Medicinal Chemistry, Current Bioactive Compounds, and Pharmacology & Pharmacy and has authored approximately 265 scientific publications, book articles and proceedings, and 20 patents/patents applications.

Dr. Kyle is the Vice President, Discovery Research of Purdue Pharma L.P. He has 30 years of experience in the areas of CNS, pain and inflammation. Previously, Dr. Kyle served as Director in Discovery Research at Nova Pharmaceutical Corporation and Scios, Inc. He received his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Texas Tech University. Dr. Kyle is an inventor of more than 60 issued US patents and has published nearly 200 manuscripts, review articles and abstracts. He serves on the editorial advisory board of multiple journals for chemistry and pharmacology and is a member of the Dean’s CSLA advisory board at the New Jersey Institute of Technology.

Enza Lacivita obtained her PhD in Medicinal Chemistry in 2001 at the University of Bari Aldo Moro. She was appointed as Associate Professor in Medicinal Chemistry in 2017 (Department of Pharmacy – Drug Science) at the same University. Her research activities have been focused on the study of structure-activity relationships of “drug-like” ligands for GPCRs involved in neuropsychiatric disorders, such serotonin and dopamine receptors, and in neuroinflammatory processes. Enza Lacivita is co-author of more than 80 papers in peer-reviewed journals and co- inventor of four patent applications. She has been Principal Investigator of several national and international research projects.

His scientific career started in 1996 as Lecturer in medicinal chemistry at University of Palermo. In the first years, he worked on synthesis of heterocyclic compounds with antiproliferative activity. After the experience in USA, where he worked in the research group of Prof A.R. Katritzky, his interests were driven to molecular modelling. He is co-author of 96 papers published on ISI recognized international journals, with H-index 27. He has been involved in several research projects and he has actively participated in the elaboration of several of them. He is expert evaluator for HORIZON2020."

Antonio Lavecchia is a Professor of Medicinal Chemistry and the Head of Drug Discovery Laboratory at the Department of Pharmacy of the University of Napoli Federico II. He received his PhD in Pharmaceutical Sciences in 1999 from the University of Catania, Italy. During his doctoral studies, he conducted research in the College of Pharmacy at the University of Minnesota (USA). His research has combined computational chemistry with drug discovery, focusing on cancer, diabetes, and HIV/AIDS diseases. Notably, Prof. Lavecchia is author of more than 120 scientific articles, 3 PCT patents, and 1 book chapter. In 2006 he was awarded the Farmindustria Prize for Pharmaceutical Research.

Marcello Leopoldo obtained the degree in Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Technologies (honors) at the University of Bari in 1991. At the same University, he was appointed Research Associate in Medicinal Chemistry (1992) and then Associate Professor (2001). He has received the Habilitation as Full Professor in 2015. He has published 115 papers focused on the development of selective ligands for dopamine, serotonin and formyl peptide receptors. Various selective 5-HT7 receptor agonists have been identified in his lab, including LP-211 which has been extensively used to explore the therapeutic potential of 5-HT7 receptor activation. He is inventor of eight patent applications.

Dr. Hao Lin is a Professor of the Center for Informational Biology at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China. He received his Ph.D. from Inner Mongolia University, P.R. China in 2007. His researches focused on Bioinformatics and Systems Biology. He has published over 110 peer-reviewed papers in SCI-indexed journals.

Dr Ling is a Professor at the Department of Anatomy, National University of Singapore. He has more than 40 years of teaching experience in Human Anatomy, and was the head of the department from 1998-2008. His pioneering research was on the microglia. He first characterized the ultrastructure of microglia and demonstrated experimentally that microglia originate from the blood monocytes. His recent work focuses mainly on the roles of activated microglia in neuroinflammation. He obtained his PhD from the University of Cambridge and was awarded Doctor of Science by the National University of Singapore. He was conferred an Emeritus Professorship in 2013.

Vincenzo Lionetti is an Associate Professor of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine at Institute of Life Sciences of Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna (Pisa, Italy) since 2014. He graduated in Medicine at the University of Bari (Italy) in 1999 and received the Specialization in Anesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine at the University of Turin (Italy) in 2003. He received the PhD in Innovative Strategies in Biomedical Research at the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna of Pisa in 2007. He is a member of the panel of experts of the Research Executive Agency of the European Commission for the Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions.

Prof. Dr. Xinyong Liu received his B.S. and M.S. degrees from School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Shandong Medical University, in 1984 and 1991, respectively. From 1997 to 1999, he worked at Instituto de Quimica Medica (CSIC) in Spain as a senior visiting scholar. He obtained his Ph.D. from Shandong University in 2004. Presently, he is the director of Institute of Medicinal Chemistry, Dean of the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Shandong University. He is currently serving as Editor of the “Journal of Chemistry” and on the editorial board of more than 20 academic journals. In his medicinal chemistry research of antiviral and cardiovascular drugs, he has published more than 300 paper and 6 monographs and granted 34 patents presently.

Liang Ma received B. Sc. and Ph. D. degrees from Chemistry College of Sichuan University. I now focus on the study of medicinal chemistry for kidney diseases and the involved mechanisms. Now I am an associate Professor of Nephrology at the Kidney research lab, Division of nephrology, West China Hospital of Sichuan University. I have authored 80 publications in international journals including J Med Chem, Eur J Med Chem, and Curr Med Chem, so on. I served as an official reviewer for more than 10 international journals. I have received several national funds to support his work in the fields of Nephrology, Medicinal chemistry and Pharmacology.

Dr. Clementina Manera received Research Doctorate (PhD) in Medicinal Chemistry and Master's Degree in Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Technology from the University of Pisa. Currently she is Associate Professor in Medicinal Chemistry at the Department of Pharmacy of the same University. She has authored/coauthored over ninety publications on peer reviewed pharmaceutical chemistry journals of international repute. She has over twenty years of experience in research and development of drug candidates for the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases and as anticancer. In recent years she focused on the design, synthesis and pharmacological evaluation of modulators of endocannabinoid system and on the development of new analytical methods for the determination of biologically active small organic molecules.

Dr. Mangalagiu is a professor of organic and medicinal chemistry and Vice-Rector with research at “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University of Iasi, Romania. Previously, prof. Mangalagiu served as Dean, Vice-Dean, Head of Organic Chemistry Department, etc. at Faculty of Chemistry. He has nearly 30 years of experience in the research, focused in the area of Heterocycles Compounds. He has over 160 papers, 13 patents, 3 international chapter books, etc. He was Visiting Professor and/or invited speaker to prestigious foreign universities (Ludwig Maximilianus University Munchen and Technische Universität Braunschweig, University of Florence, Universite D’Angers), awarded with numerous prizes and honours: DAAD and NATO award, “Costin D. Nenitescu Medal” (Romanian Society of Chemistry), “Al.I.Cuza University Award in Research”, “Grand Prize Euroinvent” (Euroinvent, Romania), Special Award of Croatian Association of Inventors, etc.

Mauro Maniscalco is the Director of the research laboratory on “Inflammation of Airways” at the Research Institute Fondazione S. Maugeri of Telese and Consultant of Respiratory Medicine at the Hospital of Casoria (Italy). He completed his PhD from the department of Pharmacology at Karolinska Institute of Stockholm carrying out research on exhaled Nitric Oxide. Currently, he is carrying out research on the characterization of biomolecular markers in EBC of patients with respiratory disorders. During his career he has authored more than 80 peer reviewed scientific papers and has served as reviewer for more than 50 peer reviewed medical journals.

Dr McGeary is an Associate Professor in the School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences, and an Affiliate Associate Professor in the School of Pharmacy at The University of Queensland, Australia. Dr McGeary has authored over 75 publications, as well as 3 book chapters and 11 patents. His research interests encompass the development of new synthetic methodologies, and the design and synthesis of potent inhibitors of metalloenzymes.

Prof. Méndez-Sánchez serves as the Head of Liver Research Unit at the Medica Sur Clinic & Foundation in Mexico City. He has more than 25 years of experience in research in gastrointestinal and chronic liver diseases. Prof. Méndez-Sánchez holds Master and PhD degrees in Medical Sciences from the Faculty of Medicine of the National University of Mexico and a postdoc from Harvard University. Prof. Méndez-Sánchez has authored more than 225 manuscripts, 2 patents and an editor of 15 text books on the Gastroenterology and Hepatology fields. Prof. Méndez-Sánchez is a faculty at the National University of Mexico where he teaches in the Master and PhD programs.

Sergey N. Mikhailov has completed his PhD in 1976 and DSc in1990 from Engelhard Institute of Molecular Biology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. In 1995 he was appointed as a head of a Lab at the same Institute. As a Postdoctoral fellow and visiting Professor he worked in the famous chemical Labs of Czechoslovakia, Canada, Germany and Belgium. His research interests include chemistry and medicinal chemistry of nucleosides, nucleotides and oligonucleotides, their biological activity and physico-chemical investigations, substrate properties of these analogs in enzymatic reactions. He has published >250 research papers.

Ryuichi Morishita, M.D., Ph.D., graduated from Osaka University Medical School in 1987, and received Ph. D. from Osaka University in 1991. After postdoctoral Fellow at the Stanford University School of Medicine, he served as an Assistant Professor, at the Department of Geriatric Medicine, Osaka University Medical School from 1994 to 1998. Then, from 1998 to 2003, he was the Associate Professor, Division of Gene Therapy Science, Osaka University Medical School. Then, he became the Professor and Chairman of Division of Clinical Gene Therapy, Graduate School of Medicine, Osaka University Medical School from 2003.

Dr. Muñoz-Torrero holds a PhD in Pharmacy (Medicinal Chemistry) from the University of Barcelona. Currently Dr. Muñoz-Torrero is Associate Professor of Organic and Medicinal Chemistry and Vice-Dean of Research at the Faculty of Pharmacy and Food Sciences of the University of Barcelona. He has authored more than 80 papers, 9 patents, and 3 book chapters, and guest-edited 5 special issues (Current Pharmaceutical Design, Current Medicinal Chemistry and Molecules) on anti-Alzheimer and multitarget drugs and 5 E-books on recent advances in pharmaceutical sciences. His research focuses on the design and synthesis of novel drug candidates against Alzheimer’s disease, malaria, and trypanosomiases.

Seyed Mohammad Nabavi is a biotechnologist and senior scientist of Applied Biotechnology Research Center, Baqiyatallah University of Medical Science and a member of Iran's National Elites Foundation. His research focuses on the molecular pharmacology of natural products. He is author/co-author of 250 publications in international journals, 51 communications at national and international congress, and six chapters in book series. Seyed Mohammad Nabavi has been selected as a group of scientists recognized as Highly Cited Researchers by Clarivate Analytics, 2018.

Prof. Narasimhan B, currrently working as Professor, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Maharshi Dayanand University, Rohtak. His key areas of research includes synthesis, QSAR, anticancer and antimicrobial screening of medicinal compounds. Up to now, Professor Narasimhan has published around 160 (140 International and 20 National) articles in SCI indexed journals with around 2928 citations. He has an H index of 26 and i10 index of 64 to his credit. He also serves as Editorial Board Member and Reviewer in number of national and international journals. Prof. Narasimhan is a recipient of APTI-Best Pharmaceutical Scientist Award-2015 and APP-Young Pharmaceutical Scientist Award-2015.

Orazio Nicolotti graduated in Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Technology with full marks and honour in 1997 and received the Ph.D. in Drug Sciences in 2001. Major expertises in molecular and data modelling: drug design; QSAR; predictive toxicology; combinatorial library design; evolutionary algorithms; docking and molecular dynamics. So far author of more than 100 research papers, 3 book chapters, 1 international patent. Principal investigator of several research funded projects and industrial agreements for technology transfer.

Dr. Milan M. Obradovic is a senior research associate in the Department of Radiobiology and Molecular Genetics at Institute of Nuclear Sciences “Vinca”, University of Belgrade, Serbia. He received a PhD in molecular biology and endocrinology from the University of Belgrade, Serbia. He has experience in basic and clinical science research. His investigative interest is to clarify the role of different hormones in normal cardiovascular biology and in pathophysiological conditions such as obesity, insulin resistance, diabetes, metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular diseases. He serves as a member of editorial board and as a reviewer in a numerous scientific and medical journals.

Prof. Jens Pietzsch (Ph.D., M.D.) is the Head of the Department of Radiopharmaceutical and Chemical Biology at the Institute of Radiopharmaceutical Cancer Research, Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, Germany. He is also a Professor of Pathological Biochemistry at the School of Science, Technische Universität Dresden. He has more than 20 years of experience in research, now focusing on preclinical molecular imaging of cancer and cancer-associated inflammation. His main topic of interest is targeted radionuclide-based theranostics of malignant melanoma and pheochromocytoma. He has authored of more than 160 articles, reviews, and book chapters. Currently, he serves as an Associate Editor of Frontiers in Chemistry, and as Editorial Board Member of Current Medicinal Chemistry, Amino Acids, Clinical Hemorheology and Microcirculation, and Journal of Cellular Biotechnology.

Tadeusz Robak, MD, PhD, is Professor of Hematology at the Medical University of Lodz , and Head of the Department of Hematology at Copernicus Memorial Hospital in Lodz, Poland. He is Chair of the chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL) subgroup of the Polish Adult Leukemia Study Group and President of the Polish Society of Hematology. His special interests are in CLL and lymphoma, with particular emphasis on the use of purine analogues and targeted drugs. Professor Robak has been selected by the World Scientists Forum of the International Research Promotion Council for the “Eminent Scientist of the Year 2010” award in haematology-oncology.

Dr. Manuela Rodriquez has attained a degree of Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Chemistry sciences. She is presently serving as an Associate Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the Department of Pharmacy, University of Salerno (Italy), where she teaches Medicinal Chemistry to undergraduate students. She has contributed more than 57 publications, having citations around 991. Dr. Manuela’s research focuses on regulation of epigenetic post-transcriptional chemical modification, molecular diversity oriented synthesis, microwave-assisted synthesis and total synthesis of pharmacological active natural products as lead compound for drug optimization, and as chemical tools to study dynamic biological processes.

Vincenzo Russo, MD PhD MMSc, is an Assistant Professor of Cardiology at School of Medicine - University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli” and Consultant Cardiologist and Electrophysiologist at Monaldi Hospital in Naples, Italy. His research interest are in the areas of Cardiovascular Pharmacotherapy, Thrombosis and Hemostasis, Cardiac Rhythm Disorders, Cardiac Pacing, Clinical Electrophysiology, Syncope, Neuromuscular Disorders, Sudden Death, and Hematological Disorders.

Professor Satyajit Sarker is the Director of School of Pharmacy and Biomolecular Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University. He is a Professor of Pharmacy and leads the Medicinal Chemistry and Natural Products Research Group. He has years of experience in research on various aspects of bioactive natural products. He has authored over 400 publications, including popular books like, Natural Products Isolation, and Chemistry for Pharmacy Students, the latter is also translated into Greek, Japanese and Portuguese languages. He is the Vice-President of the Phytochemical Society of Europe, and the Editor-in-Chief of Phytochemical Analysis. He serves in the Editorial Boards of several journals.

Dr. Schmidhammer is a Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the Center for Molecular Biosciences Innsbruck (CMBI), University of Innsbruck, Austria. He has more than 35 years of experience in drug discovery and development of medications aimed to treat neuropsychiatric disorders (e.g. pain, addicition, depression, anxiety, epilepsy) and immunological diseases. He has been a Visiting Scientist at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA and other research institutions worldwide. Dr. Schmidhammer has authored more than 130 original research articles, 9 book chapters and 21 patents. The scientific achievements of Dr. Schmidhammer have been recognized by many grants, several honors and awards.

Alessandro Serretti MD, PhD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Bologna University, Italy. He is a Coordinator of a research unit active in genetic and clinical studies of major psychoses. Alessandro Serretti has authored more than 480 scientific papers in peer reviewed journals with an H-Index of 66. He has served as a reviewer and editorial board member of 170 journals and funding agencies.

Mikhail Soloviev received an MSc in Molecular Biology in and Ph.D. in Biochemistry in 1996. He conducted his research in the MRC Molecular Neurobiology Unit, Cambridge and since 1993 at the Royal Free Hospital London. In 1997 he joined MRC Anatomical Neuropharmacology Unit Oxford, to work on the biology of metabotropic glutamate receptors. In 2001 he joined Oxford Glycosciences Ltd, as Head of Protein Assays, to develop affinity proteomics technologies and to enhance cancer biomarker discovery platform. He is currently a Senior Lecturer at Royal Holloway University of London. His main research interests include (i) Rational engineering of therapeutic and stimuli-responsive proteins and (ii) Molecular biomarkers of cancer. Analytical Biochemistry and Nanobiotechnology have been long-term research passion.

Tatjana Stanojković was born in Belgrade on June 26, 1966. She graduated from the Faculty of Biology of the University of Belgrade, Department of Molecular Biology and Physiology. She has been employed at the Institute of Oncology and Radiology of Serbia since 1997, since July 2014, as head of the Department of Biological Response Laboratory, Department of Experimental Oncology. Field of expertise: Experimental oncology, Medicinal Chemistry, in vitro investigation of the anticancer activity of novel synthesized compounds, natural product and marine organisms. Member of the Editorial Board, BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine since 2012.

Gabriele Stocco is Assistant Professor in Pharmacology at the University of Trieste since 2012. His research interest focuses on translational studies on pharmacogenetics and therapy personalization of antimetabolites and biologics used in chronic and oncologic pediatric diseases. Gabriele Stocco has received a degree in Medicinal Chemistry with honors from the University of Trieste, a PhD in Pharmacology from the University of Trieste and a doctoral and post-doctoral training from St.Jude Children’s Hospital in Memphis, USA, where he attended in 2003 and from 2006 to 2011 the laboratory of prof. William Evans. His scientific effort has been witnessed by more than 50 scientific publications.

Dr. Stockert has received a Physician degree and MD degrees (Buenos Aires, UBA, and Autonomous University of Madrid). He was awarded with doctorates Honoris causa (University of Río Cuarto and UBA), and research fellowships from the International Agency for Research on Cancer, and Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung. Dr. Stockert belongs to the Editorial Board of Acta Histochemica, Biotechnic and Histochemistry, Current Medicinal Chemistry, and Internacional Journal of Biomedical Science. His principal research lines are fluorescence histochemistry, organelle labeling, and photodynamic therapy. He has published 323 papers on the above fields, and supervised 12 doctoral thesis.

CLAUDIU T. SUPURAN is the Professor of medicinal chemistry at the Neurofarba Department, Section of Pharmaceutical and Nutriceutical Sciences, University of Florence, Italy. He has published more than 1250 papers, his Hirsch factor is h = 110; the number of citations since 1995 > 49800. His main research interest is on enzyme inhibitors, and especially carbonic anhydrase inhibitors, of which he discovered several new classes in the last years. One of the sulfonamides discovered in his group entered Phase I clinical trials in 2014 for the treatment of advanced, metastatic solid tumors. He is the Editor-in-Chief of Expert Opinion on Therapeutic Patents, Journal of Enzyme Inhibition and Medicinal Chemistry, Current Enzyme Inhibition, etc. For the last 25 years the main interest of his research was focused on metallo-enzymes and their modulators of activity. In 2013, he was rated as the most cited scientists in Pharmacology & Toxicology by LabTimes (LabTimes 2013, 5, 38).

Nikos Tagmatarchis is a Deputy Director in the Theoretical and Physical Chemistry Institute, at the National Hellenic Research Foundation, in Athens, Greece. He has studied chemistry and received his PhD from the Chemistry Department, University of Crete, Greece (1997). Dr. Tagmatarchis accomplishments are reflected in over 180 scientific peer-reviewed research articles, while his work has been cited more than 8200 times associated with an h-index of 37. He has been the recipient of the European Young Investigator Award (2004), Visiting Professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (2011-2012) and Invited Fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science in Japan (2013-2014).

Dr. Igor V. Tetko obtained his MSc degree (with honor) from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (USSR), received his PhD from the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences and Habilitation in Chemoinformatics from the University of Strasbourg. He is group leader of Chemoinformatics at the Helmholtz Zentrum München, Germany where he coordinates Horizon2020 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Innovative Training Network (ITN) “Big Data in Chemistry”. Dr. Tetko is also the CEO of BIGCHEM GmbH, which develops and licenses software technologies for big data analysis in chemistry and life sciences. Dr. Tetko is on the list of The Most Cited Researchers in Computer Sci. & Eng.

Dr. Petri Turhanen, Ph.D, is university researcher at University of Eastern Finland (UEF), School of Pharmacy. He received M.Sc. in organic chemistry at University of Jyväskylä in 1997 and Ph.D. in synthetic organic and medicinal chemistry at University of Kuopio in 2003. His scientific interests are focused on synthetic chemistry with green chemistry aspect; mainly on organophosphorus chemistry (like bisphosphonates and ATP analogues) and novel applications of prepared compounds. Dr. Turhanen has authored more than 50 publications and conference presentations being a main author in most of them, he also has 2 patents.

Dr. Dolores Viña is Associate Professor of Pharmacology at the University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain. She obtained her PhD in Organic Chemistry in 2003 at the same University. She did postdoctoral training in nucleoside chemistry at the Rega Institute KU Leuven, Belgium. She was appointed as Assistant Professor in Pharmaceutical Chemistry (2005) at the University of Salamanca, Spain. Her research activities are currently focused on combining the study of cellular and molecular pharmacology and medical chemistry in order to design and develop new drugs against neurodegenerative disorders, with emphasis on those in which oxidative stress plays a fundamental role such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases. Dr. Viña is co-author of more than 60 papers in peer-reviewed journals and co-inventor of two patent applications.

Steven M. Weinreb, Russell and Mildred Marker Professor of Natural Products Chemistry at Penn State, obtained a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University, and received his doctorate from the University of Rochester with Marshall Gates in 1967. He had NIH-sponsored postdoctoral fellowships at Columbia University with Gilbert Stork and at MIT with George Buchi. He began his independent scientific career at Fordham University in 1970 and joined the faculty at Penn State in 1978. He was named Marker Professor in 1987. Professor Weinreb’s research is on the total synthesis of natural products and the development of synthetic methods.

Dr. Xu is a Professor & Founding Director of Research Center for Drug Discovery at the Sun Yat-Sen University. He has more than 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry, practicing medicinal chemistry, chemoinformatics and computer-aided drug design in the fields of discovering anti-infectious, and anti-metabolic syndrome agents. Previously, Dr. Xu served as the Director of CADD at DPI/Biofocus, Principal scientist at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc., R&D director at BIO-RAD Sadtler Division. He holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Science & Technology of China. He has authored more than 80 publications and 10 patents. Dr. Xu is also an adjunct Professor of University of Pittsburgh and Melboune RMIT University. With nearly 50 scientists, his labs are facilitated for herbal medicine studies, structure biology, pharmacology, and high performance computing.

Dr. Peng Zhan is currently working as Associate Professor in Shandong University. In 2012, he was appointed as a JSPS Postdoctoral Fellow in Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, Japan. His research area involves discovery of novel antiviral anticancer and neurodegenerative diseases-related agents based on the rational drug design approaches. So far, he has published more than 100I academic papers, more than 20 patents as co-inventor, and received the first prize of Shandong Province Science (2010), CPA-Servier Young Investigator Awards in Medicinal Chemistry (2016), and and many other honors and awards.

Ning Zhang graduated from Nankai University, China, and received his Ph.D. degree in bioinformatics in 2010. He worked as a post-doctor in Nankai University from 2011 to 2012, and as a visiting scholar in Griffith University, Australia from 2016 to 2017. Now he is an associate professor in Department of Biomedical Engineering, Tianjin University. His interests include bioinformatics, computational biology, system biology, biomedical imaging analysis, database, and software design. He has published over 60 research papers in outstanding journals, and was evaluated as "Top 1%" highest cited Chinese author in Biology field by Royal Society of Chemistry, UK, in 2015.

Professor Zhang received the Ph.D. degree in 2000, and completed Postdoctoral research from Georgetown University and Harvard Medical School during 2002-2004. He was promoted to Instructor of Harvard Medical School in 2004 and received Alfred Pope Young Investigator and Adam Corneel Young Investigator awards. In 2006, he received the Hundred Talent Project award from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and became the Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica (SIMM). In 2011, he was awarded the Distinguished Young Investigator award from the Chinese Natural Science Foundation. He has authored or co-authored over 110 publications and 40 patents. Several drug candidates from his research group are now under clinical or preclinical studies.

Professor Zhang received the Ph.D. degree in 2000, and completed Postdoctoral research from Georgetown University and Harvard Medical School during 2002-2004. He was promoted to Instructor of Harvard Medical School in 2004 and received Alfred Pope Young Investigator and Adam Corneel Young Investigator awards. In 2006, he received the Hundred Talent Project award from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and became the Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica (SIMM). In 2011, he was awarded the Distinguished Young Investigator award from the Chinese Natural Science Foundation. He has authored or co-authored over 110 publications and 40 patents. Several drug candidates from his research group are now under clinical or preclinical studies.

Prof. Raffaele Pezzani is a biologist and a physician with a PhD in Neuroscience at the University of Padova, Italy. He has over 50 scientific publications that have more than 640 citations. He has been serving as an editorial board member and as an editor of reputed impacted journals. He is the principal investigator of his research group in Padova, having a long lasting and valid experience (more than 20 years) in biology and medicine.

Dr. Mirjana B. Čolović, a research associate, employed at University of Belgrade, Serbia, from 2005. Her research activities are in the field of enzymology, toxicology, biosensors, physiologically active compounds and their interaction with biomolecules. She has published 36 papers in impacted international journals, 4 chapters in books, 3 articles in national scientific journals, and over 60 abstracts in international and national scientific meetings. She served as a reviewer in over 20 international journals and 9 international projects.

Dr. Gaetano Caramori,MD, PhD, is a Full Professor in Respiratory Medicine, at the Dipartimento di Scienze Biomediche, Odontoiatriche e delle Immagini Morfologiche e Funzionali (BIOMORF), University of Messina, Italy, Head of the Pulmonology Unit at the University Hospital Gaetano Martino of Messina and the Specialisation School in Respiratory Diseases of the University of Messina, Italy (www.unime.it). Gaetano Caramori is, from 2001, Honorary Staff at the Airway Disease Section, National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College of London, UK. Dr. Gaetano Caramori has reached an H index=46. He is currently among the 300 Top Italian Scientists & Academics in Clinical Sciences using an independent ranking obtained on the basis of the Google Scholar database (h-index>30 only). He has published 158 articles in International Scientific peer-reviewed indexed Journals, including all the major Journals of the Respiratory System and The New England Journal of Medicine, The Lancet and Nature Medicine.

Dr Kostara Christina is currently an Academic Fellow at the Laboratory of Clinical Chemistry, Faculty of Medicine, School of Health Sciences, University of Ioannina, Greece. She received M.Sc degree from the Department of Chemistry, University of Ioannina, Greece (2018), Bachelor of Science in Chemistry, from the same university (2003), and a PhD degree from the Faculty of Medicine, School of Health Sciences, University of Ioannina, Greece (2007). She is also acquiring a Bachelor in Medicine from the Faculty of Medicine, School of Health Sciences, University of Ioannina, Greece. She has published several articles in distinguished journals.

Dr. Kuen-Song Lin, is a senior professor of the Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, Yuan Ze University in Taiwan. He is also the Director of Environmental Technology Research Centre (ETRC) and the Dean of Research and Development (R&D office) in Yuan Ze University. His research topics include the waste recycling/reutilization, on-site soil/water pollution remediation, environmental/photocatalytic catalyst preparation technologies, hydrogen storage, carbon capture, and sustainable energy generation. Prof. Lin has published more than 150 articles with citations of more than 3294 (google search on Nov. 29, 2019; High citation Index = 29; i10 index = 68).

Massimo Pancione received his B.A. degree in Biochemistry from the University of Naples, Federico II, Italy and its Ph.D. degree from the University of Sannio, Benevento, Italy. He worked on the human promoter of the retinol-binding protein as an undergraduate student with Prof. Vittorio Colantuoni in Naples. Later, he completed research training at National Research Council, Avellino, Italy and the Spanish National Cancer Research Center, Madrid, Spain working on mice models of intestinal disease and cancer. He is currently a Researcher of Molecular Biology and Head of the Laboratory of Molecular Oncology and Signal Transduction at the Department of Science and Technology, University of Sannio, Benevento, Italy. In the last years, his research has focused on understanding the molecular mechanisms by which cancer cells of aggressive human tumors grow and remain hidden to metastasize in other organs.

Dr. Jelena Popović-Djordjević is a Professor of Organic Chemistry at the University of Belgrade, Faculty of Agriculture (Department for Food Technology and Biochemistry), Belgrade, Serbia. She is a graduate of the University of Belgrade, Faculty of Chemistry, Belgrade, Serbia, where she received her B.A. degree in Chemistry (applied) and her Ph.D. degree in Chemistry (organic) (in 2010). She published over 150 publications, including 40 papers in the leading international peer-reviewed journals, 2 book chapters, and 40 papers on the international and national conferences. Her main research is related to natural product Chemistry, biological activity of natural and synthetic compounds, food chemistry and environmental chemistry. She is a member of the Serbian Chemical Society, the Serbian Water Protection Society, and the Editorial board member in Ecological Safety and Balanced Use of Resources.

Prof. Moshe Schaffer is a Senior Consultant in Barzilai Medical Centre, Dept. of Oncology, affiliated to Faculty of Health Sciences of the Negev, Ben- Gurion University, Israel. He studied Medicine at the University of Padova, Italy, and did his Residency in Radiation Oncology at the University of Goettingen, and the University of Munich, Germany. He has a German and Israeli Board Certificate. He has experience in research and clinical working in Radiation Oncology. The main fields are selective and specific Radiosensitizers, Hyperthermia, and Photodynamic Therapy. Previously, he served as a Deputy Chairman at the Department of Radiation Oncology, University of Munich, Germany. He has a PhD degree from Munich University. Notably, he has authored more than 65 manuscripts, 12 patents, 10 book chapters, and is an Assoc. Editor in 4 scientific Journals. Prof. Schaffer is also an adjunct senior faculty member at the Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University, of the Negev, Israel, and teaches Radiation Therapy and Radiation Biology.

Graduate from the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, from São Paulo State University (UNESP) in Pharmacy and Biochemistry (1988). Has a Ph.D. in Pathologic Anatomy at Campinas State University’s School of Medicine (UNICAMP) for developing a research of high-risk Human Papillomavirus (HPV), Her first post-doctorate study was accomplished at the University of São Paulo’s School of Medicine of Ribeirão Preto (FMUSP), After that, she was accepted to a second post-doctoral study in Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, at the Department of Infectious Diseases, She’s spent all her career investigating therapeutic strategies using natural compounds against cancer development, engaging in a great variety of studies, with an emphasis in head and neck cancer, as well as cervical cancer, all associated to HPV infection. She is, presently, Associated Professor of Cytology and Cellular Biology, at the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences (UNESP). She belongs to an officially recognized excellence post-graduation course in Bioscience and Biotechnology Applied to Pharmacy, according CAPES (Brazilian Scientific Foundation to Research)

Tatjana Stanojković was born in Belgrade on June 26, 1966. She graduated from the Faculty of Biology of the University of Belgrade, Department of Molecular Biology and Physiology. She has been employed at the Institute of Oncology and Radiology of Serbia since 1997, since July 2014, as head of the Department of Biological Response Laboratory, Department of Experimental Oncology. Field of expertise: Experimental oncology, Medicinal Chemistry, in vitro investigation of the anticancer activity of novel synthesized compounds, natural product and marine organisms. Member of the Editorial Board, BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine since 2012.

Dr. Chi-Meng Tzeng is a full Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences at Xiamen University, China. He received graduated training in National Tsing- Hua University Nuclear Science School in Radiation Biology, ROC (1989~1993) and Stanford University Medical School in Biochemistry, Microbiology and Immunology USA (1995-2000). Military service as a MD Captain in Tri-Service General Hospital (1993-1995). He was appointed to a principal Investigator in Medical R&D and industrialization at Academic Sinica and National Taiwan University Hospital (2000-2005), conducting fingerprint profiling of adenocarcinoma and herbal medicine through HTS biochips platform technologies. Nowadays, he is fully dedicating in translational medicine among liquid biopsy, microbiota, neoantigen, NGS, -OMICs, immune-cell therapy, AI- big data, herbal medicine and combination theranostics, as well as contributed over 60 SCIs, 4 book chapters, 13 patents and 14 commercial products, IVDs, supplements and medication.

Dr. Wu’s current research interests focus on the development of functional polymeric materials for pharmaceutical applications in terms of controllable drug delivery or gene delivery, with over 70 publications on Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., ACS Nano, Adv. Mater., Small, Adv. Healthcare Mater., Biomacromolecules etc and personal H-index of 25 (Google Scholar).

Kang Xu was born in Wuhan, China at May, 1987. He received his M.M. degree in Hubei University of Chinese Medicine, Wuhan, China and his Ph.D. degree from Chongqing University. He studied on the stem cell engineering and molecular therapy as a joint Ph.D. student for 2 years in University of California, Berkeley (UCB), and as a junior researcher in University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He has been employed at the Wuhan Union hospital, Huazhong University of Science and Technology since Aug 2017. Field of expertise: Chemical based therapeutic mechanism on cardiovascular diseases, in vitro and in vivo investigation of the anti-inflammation activity on arthritis of natural or novel synthesized compounds, wound repair and regeneration, with over 30 publications on Phytotherapy research, Frontiers in Pharmacology, Cell proliferation, Wound repair and regeneration, Pharmaceutical biology and etc., Maximum citations of 20 per one article, as reviewers of Inflammation, Life sciences and etc.

Huaming Yang is a professor in the School of Minerals Processing and Bioengineering at Central South University, China. He completed his Ph.D. at Central South University of Technology in 1998, and went to the University of Bristol as a visiting professor from 2008- 2009. Dr. Yang was elected a leading talent of the National "Ten Thousand Talents Program" in 2016, and awarded the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars in China in 2012. His research interests involve the synthesis strategy and application of advanced biomedical materials, and the interactions between nanoclay and cell.

Prof. Kun Zhang is a Research Fellow and a PhD advisor who comes from Shanghai Tenth Peoples’ Hospital. Nowadays, he is the Deputy Director of Ultrasound Research and Education Institute, Tongji University, School of Medicine. He has published 18 SCI papers as the first author or corresponding author in different journals. He has been chosen as the reviewer of some top journals including Advanced Materials, ACS Nano, Advanced Functional Materials Advanced Sciences, Biomaterials, ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, and Theranostics. He is also elected as the members or committee members of several academic organizations. He is engaged in molecular imaging and corresponding probe design involving MRI, fluorescence imaging and ultrasound imaging as well as multi-modal imaging, and he is also an expert in immunotherapy, gene editing, tumour microenvironment modulation & monitoring, regenerative medicine, nanomedicine and interdisciplinary research.