About

Name: Jonathan Adams

Current Affiliation: School of Geography and Oceanography Nanjing University, Nanjing.

Position: Full Professor

Research

Research field: Environmental Microbiology and Genomics of Crop Plants / Soils / Sediments / Biofilms

Research interest: 

• Metagenetics and metagenomics of plant microbiomes, soils, sediments
• Biogeography of microbes and macroorganisms
• Past vegetation changes

Keywords and techniques: Metagenetics, metagenomics, microbiomes, soils, plants, quaternary, biogeography

Biosketch

Education: University of Oxford (Bachelors), PhD University of Aix-Marseille II, postdoc University of Cambridge Previous Academic positions: Adelaide University, Rutgers University, Seoul National University Publications: About 160 papers published, about 8,800 citations, H Factor 47 (Google Scholar)

Publications

• JM Adams, H Faure, L Faure-Denard, JM McGlade, FI Woodward. Increases in terrestrial carbon storage from the Last Glacial Maximum to the present. Nature 348 (6303), 711-714, 1990.
• JM Adams, FI Woodward. Patterns in tree species richness as a test of the glacial extinction hypothesis. Nature 339 (6227), 699-701, 1989.
• BM Tripathi, JC Stegen, M Kim, K Dong, JM Adams, YK Lee. Soil pH mediates the balance between stochastic and deterministic assembly of bacteria. The ISME journal 12 (4), 1072-1083, 2018. 246
• T Yang, JM Adams, Y Shi, J He, X Jing, L Chen, L Tedersoo, H Chu. Soil fungal diversity in natural grasslands of the Tibetan Plateau: associations with plant diversity and productivity. New Phytologist 215 (2), 756-765, 2017.
• Y Yang, Y Shi, D Kerfahi, MC Ogwu, J Wang, K Dong, K Takahashi, Moroenyane I, Adams JM. Elevation-related climate trends dominate fungal co-occurrence network structure and the abundance of keystone taxa on Mt. Norikura, Japan. Science of The Total Environment 799, 149368, 2021.​​​​​​

     

About

Name: Mahinur S. Akkaya

Research

Biosketch

Education:

• The Ohio State University, OSBP (Ohio State Biochemistry Program), Columbus, OH, USA.
  • Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, August 1991
• The Ohio State University, Department of Chemistry, Columbus, OH, USA.
  • M.S. in Biochemistry, March 1987
• Middle East Technical University (METU), Ankara, Turkey
  • B.S. in Chemistry, June 1984 (cum laude)

Affiliations:

• USDA-Agricultural Research Service, Beltsville, MD, USA. Postdoctoral Fellow (1991-1994).
• National Institute of Health, National Cancer Institute (NIH-NCI), Laboratory of Viral Carcinogenesis, Frederick, MD, USA Senior Scientist (1994-1995)
• Middle East Technical University, Department of Chemistry Ankara, Turkey
  • Assistant Professor (1995-1997)
  • Associate Professor (1997-2003)
  • Professor (2003-2018)
• Dalian University of Technology (DLUT), School of Bioengineering, Dalian, China
  • Professor (2018-present)

Awards:

• Scientific and Technical Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) Young Investigator award, 2001. First young investigator awarded in Molecular Biology and Genetics discipline.
• Prof. Dr Mustafa Parlar Foundation, Young Investigator Award, 2002
• Prof. Dr Mustafa Parlar Foundation, PhD. Thesis advisor Award, 2002
• Prof. Dr Mustafa Parlar Foundation, PhD. Thesis advisor Award, 2001
• METU Academic Excellence Award (June, 2000)
• Popular Science Award (February, 2008)

My research spans a wide spectrum of disciplines, such as molecular biology, genetics, biochemistry, and chemical biology. The main goal is to study plant immunity and biotic or abiotic plant stress responses in relation to fungal and bacterial diseases.

 

Publications

 

About

Name: Goran Angelovski 

Current Affiliation: International Center for Primate Brain Research, CEBSIT, CAS, Shanghai 

Position: Senior Investigator 

Research

Research field: Molecular Neuroimaging 

Research interest: 

• Magnetic resonance imaging
• Functional molecular imaging
• Contrast agent development 

Keywords and techniques: NMR, MRI (1H, CEST, 19F), Hyperpolarization, Synthesis of MRI probes, Bioresponsive probes 

Biosketch

Dr. Goran Angelovski is the head of the Laboratory of Molecular and Cellular Neuroimaging at the International Center for Primate Brain Research (ICPBR), Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology (CEBSIT) of the CAS in Shanghai.  

Dr. Angelovski studied chemistry and obtained his diploma degree at the University of Belgrade (Serbia) in 2000. He continued his studies at the University of Dortmund (Germany) as a fellow of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), where he obtained the PhD degree in organic chemistry in 2004. In 2005, he moved to the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tuebingen and initially worked as the postdoctoral researcher in the Department for Physiology of Cognitive Processes, department director Prof. Nikos K. Logothetis. He became the project leader in 2007 and was promoted into the independent group leader in 2014 at the same institute. Meanwhile, he performed habilitation (venia legendi) at the University of Tuebingen in 2012 and served as the lecturer at the Faculty of Science and the Faculty of Medicine. Since 2020, Dr. Angelovski is the Senior Investigator at the International Center for Primate Brain Research (ICPBR), Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology (CEBSIT) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in Shanghai, China. His research focuses on the development of bioresponsive contrast agents to serve as functional markers for the neuroimaging applications. 

 

Publications

•  G. Angelovski, B. J. Tickner, G. Wang. “Opportunities and challenges with hyperpolarized bioresponsive probes for functional imaging using magnetic resonance”. Nature Chem. 2023, 15, 755-763. doi: 10.1038/s41557-023-01211-3 
• G. Wang, G. Angelovski. “Highly Potent MRI Contrast Agent Displaying Outstanding Sensitivity to Zinc Ions”. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2021, 60, 5734-5738, doi: 10.1002/anie.202014431. 
•  B. Tickner, G. Stasiuk, S. Duckett, G. Angelovski. “The use of yttrium in medical imaging and therapy: historical background and future perspectives”. Chem. Soc. Rev. 2020, 49, 6169-6185, doi: 10.1039/c9cs00840c. 
• G. Gambino, T. Gambino, G. Angelovski. “Combination of Bioresponsive Chelates and Perfluorinated Lipid Nanoparticles Enables in vivo MRI Probe Quantification”. Chem. Commun. 2020, 56, 9433-9436, doi: 10.1039/d0cc04416d.  
• T. Savić, G. Gambino, V. S. Bokharaie, H. R. Noori, N. K. Logothetis, G. Angelovski. “Early detection and monitoring of cerebral ischemia using calcium-responsive MRI probes”. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2019, 116, 20666-20671. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1908503116. 

About

Biosketch

Benjamin Becker is currently Full Professor and Director of the Neuroscience of Cognition, Affect and Motivation Laboratory at the University of Hong Kong. He received his Master’s and PhD Degrees from the Universities of Trier and Duesseldorf in Germany. Following post-doctoral research at the University of Bonn (Germany), he established an independent research group as a high-level foreign expert awarded Professor at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China where he still heads the Becker Affect and Motivation Laboratory. The research teams focus on determining the dynamic behavioral and neural mechanisms of emotional experiences, exploring how these mechanisms become dysregulated in mental disorders, and investigating how these processes can be regulated by novel neuromodulatory strategies, including neuropeptides (such as oxytocin and angiotensin) and advanced real-time neuroimaging-informed closed-loop modulation. To this end his research utilizes advanced neuroimaging techniques, machine learning-based neural decoding, computational modeling, as well as pharmacological and non-invasive neuromodulation strategies in both healthy individuals and clinical trials involving individuals with mental disorders. The corresponding findings have been published in over 230 peer-reviewed articles, including highly cited publications in Nature Communications, Nature Human Behaviour, Advanced Science, PNAS, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, Molecular Psychiatry, Biological Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, among others. He has received competitive research excellence awards and serves as an active editorial board member for Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Psychopharmacology, and Psychoradiology. Additionally, he was the founding section chief editor of Frontiers in Social and Affective Neuroimaging, co-leads the COVID-induced brain dysfunctions initiative of the Global Brain Consortium and coordinates the Cognitive Science Programme at The University of Hong Kong.

 

Publications

About

Name: Nicolas Berthet

Current Affiliation: The Center for Microbes, Development and Health, Key Laboratory of Discovery and Molecular Characterization of Pathogens, Institut Pasteur of Shanghai, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China

Position: Principal Investigator, Professor, head of “Discovery and Molecular Characterization of Pathogens” – DMCP’s unit

Research

Research field: Emerging Viruses and Prognostic Markers in Virus-Induced Cancers

Research interest:

• MonkeyPox virus,
• HPV,
• Cervical cancer

Keywords and techniques : high-throughput sequencing, microfluidics, computational analysisMonkey

Biosketch

Nicolas Berthet is a pharmaceutical doctor and virologist. His thesis focused on the development of several generations of a resequencing microarray for the detection and molecular characterization of a wide range of bacterial and viral pathogens such as Monkeypox virus, influenza viruses, arboviruses, viruses causing bleeding fevers (CCHF, ebola, etc.), papillomaviruses and equine arteritis virus. Between 2013 and 2017, he was in charge of a research unit that focused mainly on the study of emerging viruses at the CIRMF in Gabon, Central Africa. During this mission to Gabon, he participated in the surveillance/monitoring of infectious diseases in both human populations and in domestic and wild fauna. He has also participated in improving approaches to the identification and molecular characterization of these pathogens, in particular through the use of second-generation high-throughput sequencing locally. Indeed, he was in charge of implementing in Gabon a high-throughput sequencing and bioinformatics analysis platform dedicated to the molecular research and characterization of emerging pathogens in Central Africa. In parallel to these studies, he participated in several studies to investigate infectious etiology by high-throughput sequencing in either lepidic adenocarcinomas (former “BAC”) or in oral cavity squamous cell carcinoma in patients who did not have risk factors. From March 2020, he will join the Center for Microbes, Development and Health in the Pasteur Institute of Shanghai-Chinese Academy of Sciences to continue to develop several high-throughput sequencing approaches for pathogen discovery and molecular characterization of pathogens. In parallel, he will also develop a research project on the evaluation of HPV genome integration as a prognostic marker of progression of lesions to malignancy in cervical cancer. In 2009, he was awarded the “Prix Elisabeth Taub” from the national academy of medicine in France. In 2018, he is recipient of the talent program from CAS. He is awarded “Special experts” under the CAS President’s International Fellowship Initiative (PIFI) for 2018. Finally, he is the author of more than 60 peer-reviewed scientific articles.

Publications

• Berthet N, Descorps-Declère S, Besombes C, Curaudeau M, Nkili Meyong AA, Selekon B, Labouba I, Gonofio EC, Ouilibona RS, Simo Tchetgna HD, Feher M, Fontanet A, Kazanji M, Manuguerra JC, Hassanin A, Gessain A, Nakoune E. Genomic history of human monkey pox infections in the Central African Republic between 2001 and 2018. Sci Rep. 2021 Jun 22;11(1):13085.
• Simo Tchetgna H, Descorps-Declère S, Selekon B, Kwasiborski A, Vandenbogaert M, Manuguerra JC, Gessain A, Caro V, Nakouné E, Berthet N. Molecular characterization of a new highly divergent Mobala related arenavirus isolated from Praomys sp. rodents. Sci Rep. 2021 May 13;11(1):10188.
• Nkili-Meyong Andriniaina Andy, Moussavou-Boundzanga P, Labouba I, Koumakpayi IH, Jeannot E, Descorps-Declère S, Sastre-Garau X, Leroy EM, Belembaogo E, Berthet N. Genome-wide profiling of human papillomavirus DNA integration in liquid-based cytology specimens from a Gabonese female population using HPV capture technology. Sci Rep. 2019 Feb 6;9(1):1504.
• Pérot Philippe, Falguieres M, Arowas L, Laude H, Foy JP, Goudot P, Corre-Catelin N, Ungeheuer MN, Caro V, Heard I, Eloit M, Gessain A, Bertolus C, Berthet N. Investigation of viral etiology in potentially malignant disorders and oral squamous cell carcinomas in non-smoking, non-drinking patients. PLoS One. 2020 Apr 29;15(4):e0232138.
• Maganga Gaël*, Kapetshi J*, Berthet N*, Kebela Ilunga B, Kabange F, Mbala Kingebeni P, Mondonge V, Muyembe JJ, Bertherat E, Briand S, Cabore J, Epelboin A, Formenty P, Kobinger G, González-Angulo L, Labouba I, Manuguerra JC, Okwo-Bele JM, Dye C, Leroy EM. Ebola virus disease in the Democratic Republic of Congo. N Engl J Med. 2014 Nov 27;371(22):2083-91.

About

Name: Prof. Evelyne Bischof

Current Affiliation: Shanghai University of Medicine and Health Sciences, Shanghai, China

Position: Associate professor, Internal Medicine Specialist

Research

Research field: Internal Medicine, Longevity Medicine, Geroncology, Oncology/predictive+prognostic biomarkers

Research interests:

• Oncology/predictive+prognostic biomarkers, male breast cancer.
• Longevity medicine/ artificial intelligence (AI) in longevity medicine, digital health, precision medicine, biogerontology, geroncology.
• Biological sex and gender as biomarkers in medicine.

Keywords and techniques: Translational Science, tumors, internal medicine, prognosis.

Biosketch

Prof. Evelyne Bischof, MD, MPF, FEFIM is a clinician – chief physician associate of internal medicine at University Hospital Renji of Jiaotong University Shanghai and executive concierge longevity physician. Currently she is also affiliated with the International Center for Multimorbidity and Complexity in Medicine (ICMC), Universität Zürich, and was prev. senior physician of internal medicine at the University Hospital Basel. She is a Swiss board certified (FMH) trained in Europe, USA and China (Harvard Medical School affiliated hospitals (Mass General Hospital, Beth Israel MD, Dana Farber Institute) and Columbia University NYC; Tongji University hospitals, Shanghai and University Hospitals of Zurich and Basel (Switzerland).

Her research focus is oncology and longevity medicine, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and digital health, precision medicine, biogerontology, and geronto-oncology. She published over 80 peer-reviewed papers, is frequent speaker at scientific and medical conferences in Asia and Europe.

Long term member of various medical societies, e.g., European Federation of Internal Medicine, World Academy of Medical Sciences, Swiss Society of Internal Medicine etc.

Evelyne spent a decade practicing medicine, lecturing at medical schools, and performing clinical and translational research in New York, Shanghai, and Basel, with extensive experience in scientific research and clinical practice at the following well-known and highly reputable institutions: University Hospital of Basel, Fudan Cancer Institute and Hospital; Zhongshan Hospital, Renji Hospital and Shanghai East Hospital. She sits on several scientific and advisory boards of biotech and longevity hubs.

Publications

• Zhavoronkov, A., Bischof, E. & Lee, KF (2021). Artificial intelligence in longevity medicine. Nat Aging 1, 5–7. https://doi.org/10.1038/s43587-020-00020-4
• Biskup, E., Xin, Z., Khanna, K., Leung, T. I., & Zhang, H. (2020). Gender balance at oncology conferences in China. The Lancet. Oncology, 21(9), 1138–1140. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1470-2045(20)30463-0
• Bischof E., Scheibye-Knudsen M., Siow R., Moskalev A. (2021). Longevity medicine: upskilling the physicians of tomorrow, The Lancet Healthy Longevity, 2(4), e187 – e188. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2666-7568(21)00024-6
• Bischof, E., Siow, R. C., Zhavoronkov, A., & Kaeberlein, M. (2021). The potential of rapalogs to enhance resilience against SARS-CoV-2 infection and reduce the severity of COVID-19. The Lancet Healthy longevity, 2(2), e105–e111. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2666-7568(20)30068-4
• Levin JM, Oprea TI, Davidovich S, Clozel T, Overington JP, Vanhaelen Q, Cantor CR, Bischof E, Zhavoronkov A. Artificial intelligence, drug repurposing and peer review. Nat Biotechnol 38, 1127–1131 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41587-020-0686-x

About

Name: Amael Borzée

Current Affiliation: Nanjing Forestry University, College of Biology and the Environment, Lab of Animal Behaviour and Conservation

Position: Professor

Research

Research field: Behavioural Ecology and Conservation

Research interests:

• Behavioural ecology in relation with species fitness
• Breeding behaviour of threatened species
• Integration of molecular tools, threat assessment and ecological requirements for conservation research

Biosketch

I am now leading the Laboratory of Animal Behaviour and Conservation at Nanjing Forestry University. Prior to becoming a professor at NJFU, I was based in the Republic of Korea, where my researched focused on amphibian behavioural ecology and conservation around the Yellow sea, with a primary focus on treefrogs. I dedicated a few years to understanding the breeding behaviour of treefrogs in relation with rice agriculture, and the impact of anthropogenic development on the population dynamics of amphibian populations. My current research focus is currently shifting towards questions related to the integrated conservation of landscapes in northeast Asia, with a prioritisation of amphibians in agricultural wetlands as species that were once commons are declining sharply, but degraded habitats such as agricultural wetlands are not protected under any scheme. It is therefore important to understand which anthropogenic activities are the strongest factors of amphibian decline, and determine which action can best protect the landscape accordingly. I am currently deputy chair for the IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group and board member of the Society for Conservation Biology – Asia Section.

Publications

• Button S & Borzée A. (2021). An integrative synthesis to global amphibian conservation priorities. Global Change Biology. 27:4516–4529. DOI: 10.1111/gcb.15734
• Othman N.S., Putri T.E., Messenger R.K., Bae Y., Yang Y., Bova T., Reed T., Amin H., Chuang M-F., Jang Y. & Borzée A. (2021). Impact of south-central Asian orogenesis on Kaloula spp. (Anura: Microhylidae) radiation and implication of Pleistocene glaciation on population extension to northern latitudes. Integrative Zoology. DOI: 10.1111/1749-4877.12538
• Borzée A., Kielgast J., Wren S., Angulo A., Chen S., Magellan K., Messenger K. R. … & Bishop P. J. (2021). Using the 2020 global pandemic as a springboard to highlight the need for amphibian conservation in eastern Asia. Biological Conservation. 255:08973. DOI: 10.1016/j.biocon.2021.108973
• Borzée A., McNeely J., Magellan K., Miller J. R. B., Porter L., Dutta T., Kadinjappalli K. P., … & Zhang L. (2020). COVID-19 Highlights the Need for More Effective Wildlife Trade Legislation. Trends in Ecology & Evolution. 35(2):1052-1055. DOI: 10.1016/j.tree.2020.10.001
• Borzée A., Andersen D., Groffen J., Kim Y. I., An J., Othman S., Ri K., Nam T. Y., Bae Y., Ren J-L., Li., J-T., Chuang M-F., Yi Y., Shin Y., Kwon T., Jang Y., & Min M-S. (2020). Yellow sea mediated segregation between North East Asian Dryophytes species. Plos One. 15(6):e0234299. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0234299

About

Name: Isabel Briz Hernandez

Current Affiliation: Department of Anthropology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong

Position: PhD Candidate

Research

Keywords: Medical Anthropology, Science and Technology Studies, Clinical Trials, Immunotherapy, Personalized Medicine, Translational Science.

Research field: Medical Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies.

Research interest: Immunotherapy, clinical trials, translational science/medicine, Personalized Medicine.

Techniques: Ethnography, qualitative fieldwork, participant observation, interviews, textual analysis.

Biosketch

I am currently a PhD candidate in the Department of Anthropology in the Chinese University of Hong Kong, where I also received the Degree of Master of Arts in Anthropology. Previously I was trained as a translator and linguist in the University of Salamanca and the University of Barcelona, in Spain.

My research stands in the intersection between Medical Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies, during 15 months I have conducted ethnographic fieldwork on the development of immunotherapy for cancer treatment in Mainland China. At the lab, I study what it takes to accomplish the arduous task of conducting a pre-clinical trial of an experimental treatment and at the bedside, I explore how this new treatment is experienced by patients and their families.

Publications

About

Name: Ahimsa Campos‐Arceiz

Current Affiliation: Southeast Asia Biodiversity Research Institute & Center for Integrative Conservation, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Science

Position: Professor & Principal Investigator

Research

Research field: Ecology and Conservation

Research Interests

• Megafauna Ecology and Conservation
• Human-wildlife conflicts and coexistence
• Plant-animal interactions​​​​​​

Keywords and techniques: Asian elephant, human-elephant conflict, movement ecology, seed dispersal, herbivory, defaunation.

Biosketch

I am a conservation ecologist with interest on the social sciences. My main research focuses on the behavior, ecology, and conservation of Asian megafauna, particularly elephants, which I have studied for over 15 years. I study the ecological role of large animals in seed dispersal and work on evidence-based strategies to mitigate human-wildlife conflicts. Increasingly, my work includes human dimensions of wildlife conservation, including people’s behavior, governance, economics, and policy. I am currently based in Xishuangbanna, southwest China, and have spent nearly 20 years in Asia. I have conducted research in Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Japan, Mongolia, and other counties. I hold a PhD in Biodiversity Science from the University of Tokyo (2009) and have published over 70 articles in international scientific journals, which have been cited over 2500 times (Sep 2021). Besides research, I am very interested in local capacity building, conservation outreach, and working with local authorities to develop and implement evidence-based conservation policies. I am a former President of the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation (ATBC), former President of the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB) Asia Section, and member of the IUCN’s Asian elephant Specialist Group and the Human-Wildlife Conflict Task Force.

Publications

• Campos‐Arceiz, A., de la Torre, J.A., Wei, K., Wu, X.O., Zhu, Y., Zhao, M., Chen, S., Bai, Y., Corlett, R.T. and Chen, F., 2021. The return of the elephants: How two groups of dispersing elephants attracted the attention of billions and what can we learn from their behavior. Conservation Letters, p.e12836.
• de la Torre, J.A., Wong, E.P., Lechner, A.M., Zulaikha, N., Zawawi, A., Abdul‐Patah, P., Saaban, S., Goossens, B. and Campos‐Arceiz, A., 2020. There will be conflict–agricultural landscapes are prime, rather than marginal, habitats for Asian elephants. Animal Conservation.
• Campos-Arceiz, A., Primack, R.B., Miller-Rushing, A.J. and Maron, M., 2018. Striking underrepresentation of biodiversity-rich regions among editors of conservation journals.
• Lechner, A.M., Chan, F.K.S. and Campos-Arceiz, A., 2018. Biodiversity conservation should be a core value of China’s Belt and Road Initiative. Nature ecology & evolution, 2(3), pp.408-409.
• Wadey, J., Beyer, H.L., Saaban, S., Othman, N., Leimgruber, P. and Campos-Arceiz, A., 2018. Why did the elephant cross the road? The complex response of wild elephants to a major road in Peninsular Malaysia. Biological Conservation, 218, pp.91-98.

About

Name: Carlo Vittorio Cannistraci

Affiliated Faculty: Center for Systems Biology Dresden (CSBD)

An initiative of Max-Planck Society and Technische Universität Dresden, Germany

Position: Chair Professor, Tsinghua Laboratory of Brain and Intelligence (THBI)

Adjunct Professor, Department of Computer Science

Adjunct Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering

Director, Center for Complex Network Intelligence (CCNI) at THBI

Tsinghua University, Beijing, China

https://brain.tsinghua.edu.cn/info/faculty/724

Research

Research field: Computer Science / Data science / Artificial Intelligence / Physics of Complexity / Computational Neuroscience / Computational Biomedicine / Biomedical Engineering / Precision Medicine / Systems Biomedicine

Research interests:

• Complex network science
• Information & data science
• Machine intelligence
• Physics of complexity
• Brain/Life-inspired computing

Keywords and techniques: Complex networks, brain connectomes, systems multi-omic analysis, precision and systems biomedicine, computational prediction

Biosketch

Dr. Cannistraci is a theoretical engineer and computational innovator. He is a Professor in the Tsinghua Laboratory of Brain and Intelligence (THBI) and adjunct professor in the Department of Computer Science and department of Biomedical Engineering at Tsinghua University. He directs the Center for Complex Network Intelligence (CCNI) in THBI, which seeks to create pioneering algorithms at the interface between information science, physics of complex systems, complex networks and machine intelligence, with a particular focus in brain/life-inspired computing for big data analysis. These computational methods are often applied to precision biomedicine, neuroscience, social and economic science.

The CCNI adopts a transdisciplinary approach integrating information theory, machine intelligence and network science to investigate adaptive processes that characterize complex interacting systems at different scales, from molecules to ecological and socio-economic systems. This knowledge is leveraged to create novel and more efficient artificial intelligence algorithms; and to perform advanced analysis of patterns hidden in data, signals and images. Our theoretical effort is to translate advanced mathematical paradigms typically adopted in theoretical physics (like topology and manifold theory) to characterize many-body interactions in quantitative life science. We apply the theoretical frameworks we invent in the mission to develop computational tools for systems and network biology, personalized biomedicine and combinatorial drug therapy, social and economic data science.

Plasticity phenomena – like remodelling, growth and evolution – modify the topology of complex living systems, their internal state and their multidimensional representation in form of networks or high-dimensional datasets. Our theoretical mission is to elucidate the general rules and mechanisms that underlie this type of structural plasticity, which is at the basis of learning and memory processes in living organisms. In particular, we develop methods for topological analysis of self-adaptive and self-organizing learning systems such as protein interaction and bacteria-metabolite networks at the molecular level, and brain networks at the cellular level.

In neuroscience, we are interested in how the brain networks wire at synaptic and functional levels to modulate learning processes. And, on a molecular pathway scale, we seek to identify the network patterns that could suggest which broken functional modules are responsible for memory aberrations in neurodegenerative diseases. Since general paradigms of regeneration and degeneration can be significantly inspired by developmental biology models, we study regulatory patterns of tissue differentiation in normal and cancer conditions.

Our mission in translation and network medicine is to adopt advanced machine learning and network science approaches to integrate molecular networks and omic profiles for the definition of personalised therapeutical plans and individualised drug treatments. Furthermore, as the cardiovascular system is a paradigmatic example of an adaptive complex system, we apply our pattern recognition algorithms to explore normal/pathological conditions in cardiovascular patients.

Publications

• Claudio Duran, Giovanni Gasbarrini, Antonio Gasbarrini & Carlo Vittorio Cannistraci. Nonlinear machine learning pattern recognition and bacteria-metabolite multilayer network analysis of perturbed gastric microbiome. Nature Communications, 2021
• Mengqiao Xu, Qian Pan, Alessandro Muscoloni, Haoxiang Xia & Carlo Vittorio Cannistraci. Modular gateway-ness connectivity and structural core organization in maritime network science. Nature Communications, 2020
• Xian Xia, … , Carlo Vittorio Cannistraci, Yong Zhou & Jing-Dong J Han. Three-dimensional facial-image analysis to predict heterogeneity of the human ageing rate and the impact of lifestyle. Nature Metabolism, 2020
• Eunhye Baek, Nikhil Ranjan Das, Carlo Vittorio Cannistraci, … & Gianaurelio Cuniberti. Intrinsic plasticity of silicon nanowire neurotransistors for dynamic memory and learning functions. Nature Electronics, 2020
• Alessandro Muscoloni & Carlo Vittorio Cannistraci. Navigability evaluation of complex networks by greedy routing efficiency. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2019

About

Name: Álvaro Castells García

Current Affiliation: Guangzhou Regenerative Medicine and Health Guangdong Laboratory (GRMH-GDL)

Position: Associate Researcher

Research

Research field: Super Resolution Microscopy and Chromatin Architecture

Research interests :

• Cutting edge nanoscopy techniques
• Stemness
• Nuclear organization

Keywords: transcription, STORM, DNA-PAINT, oligoSTORM, oligopaints, single molecule localization microscopy, chromatin architecture

Biosketch

Álvaro Castells García obtained his PhD in Biomedicine by the University Pompeu Fabra (UPF) in Barcelona, Spain. During his doctorate, he worked on the lab of renewed biologist Dr Maria Pia Cosma, in her Reprogramming and Regeneration group, in the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG).

There, he participated in several projects focusing on understanding the higher chromatin folding and its interdependence with transcription, using for that Super Resolution Micorscopy. During hist time at Pia Cosma’s lab, he was a visiting scientist in the Institute for Photonic and Optical Sciences (ICFO), in the lab of Dr. Melike Lakadamyali.

After his PhD, he began his work as an Associate Researcher at the Guangzhou Regenerative Medicine and Health Guangdong Laboratory (GRMH-GDL). There, he has continued his study of chromatin architecture using Super Resolution Microscopy.

Chromatin organization is crucial for regulating gene expression. Previously, we showed that nucleosomes form groups, termed clutches. Clutch size correlated with the pluripotency grade of mouse embryonic stem cells and human induced pluripotent stem cells. In our lab, we use Super Resolution Microscopy to study the structure and organization of the chromatin at the nanoscale level.

Particularly, we are experts on the use of Single Molecule Localization Microscopy techniques, such as Stochastic Optical Reconstruction Microscopy and Points accumulation for imaging in nanoscale topography (PAINT). We have used this to study the physical relation between DNA, chromatin, cohesin and nascent RNA. Finally, we are interested in the alteration of the chromatin structure upon processes of differentiation and reprogramming.

Publications

• Neguembor MV, Martin L*, Castells-García A*, Gómez-García PA , Vicario C, , Davide CarnevalI, Alhaj Abed J, Granados-Corsellas A, Sebastian-Perez R, Sottile F, Solon J, Wu C, Lakadamyali M and Cosma MP (2021) “Transcription-mediated supercoiling regulates genome folding and loop formation” Molecular Cell doi: https://doi.org › j.molcel.2021.06.009. *Co-second
• Otterstrom J*, Castells-Garcia A*, Vicario C, Gomez-Garcia PA, Cosma MP, Lakadamyali M. (2019) “Super-resolution microscopy reveals how histone tail acetylation affects DNA compaction within nucleosomes in vivo” Nucleic Acids Research. doi:10.1093/nar/gkz593). *Co-first
• Montero, J.J., López-Silanes, I., Megías, D., F. Fraga, M., Castells-García, Á., and Blasco, M.A. (2018). “TERRA recruitment of polycomb to telomeres is essential for histone trymethylation marks at telomeric”heterochromatin. Nature Communications 9, 1548.
• Theka, I., Sottile, F., Aulicino, F., Garcia, A.C., and Cosma, M.P. (2017). “Reduced expression of Paternally Expressed Gene-3 enhances somatic cell reprogramming through mitochondrial activity perturbation”. Scientific Reports 7, 9705.

About

Name: Luis Pedro Coelho

Current Affiliation: Fudan University

Position: Junior Principal Investigator

Research

Research field: Computational Microbiome

Research interests: 

• Global microbiome
• Antimicrobial resistance
• Small proteins

Keywords and techniques: Metagenomics, computational biology, method development

Biosketch

Luis Pedro Coelho is a Junior Principal Investigator at Fudan University (Shanghai) since September 2018. His group works in computational biology, with a focus on the global microbiome. Previously, Luis held a postdoctoral Position in Peer Bork’s group at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and he has a PhD from Carnegie Mellon University (2011), where he worked on bioimage informatics for subcellular location analysis with Bob Murphy.

He has worked on the human gut microbiome, the marine microbiome (as part of the Tara Oceans project), as well as on the gut microbiome of mammals. In particular, he studied the gut microbiome of dogs and its similarity to the gut microbiome of humans. More recently, he broaded his research to encompass the global microbiome, viewing the planet as a single system (albeit a complex one, with multiple niches).

Another facet of Luis’ work is method and tool development. He developed the Mahotas library for image analysis in Python during his graduate studies, and was the he was the lead developer in the NGLess project (a tool for analysing metagenomes). More recently, his groups has developed Macrel (which identifies antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) in genomes and metanomes) as well as SemiBin (a metagenomic binning tool). Luis has used these tools to build publicly available resources such as the GMGC (Global Microbial Gene Catalog, which collates genes from thousands of metagenomes) and the AMPSphere (a collection of AMPs from the global microbiome).

Luis is also an associate editor for the Journal Of Open Research Software and PLoS Computational Biology as a member of the Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Committee of the Member of the ISCB (International Society for Computational Biology).

Publications

• S Sunagawa*, LP Coelho*, S. Chaffron*, et al. 2015. “Ocean Plankton. Structure and Function of the Global Ocean Microbiome.” Science 348 (6237): 1261359–1261359.
• CD Santos-Júnior, …, LP Coelho. 2020. “Macrel: Antimicrobial Peptide Screening in Genomes and Metagenomes.” PeerJ 8 (December): e10555.
• LP Coelho et al. 2018. “Similarity of the Dog and Human Gut Microbiomes in Gene Content and Response to Diet.” Microbiome 6 (1): 72.
• LP Coelho et al. 2019. “NG-Meta-Profiler: Fast Processing of Metagenomes Using NGLess, a Domain-Specific Language.” Microbiome 7 (1): 84.

About

Name: Jean-Marc Collard, PhD

Current Affiliation: Institut Pasteur of Shanghai • Chinese Academy of Sciences

Position: Head of Experimental Bacteriology Lab, Professor at CAS

Research

Research field:  Human Intestinal Microbiota

Research interests:

• Establishment of bacterial intestinal microbiota in neonatal period and first 1000 days of life
• Dynamics of gut microbiome during dysbiosis and disease

Keywords and techniques: Intestinal microbiota, newborns, bacterial colonizers, episymbiosis/exclusion, prophages. Culturomics, metataxonomics, metagenomics, fermentations.

Biosketch

I am a senior scientist (PhD) with more than 105 publications and experience in bacteriology, molecular biology and public health. After two post-doc Positions, I headed for 8 years in Brussels, Belgium, several National Reference Centers (Salmonella/Shigella, Neisseria meningitidis, Listeria) accredited by Belcert for the ISO 17025 norm. I extended my expertise (5 years) in the field of bacterial meningitis in Africa where I conducted several field and research projects on meningococcal carriage, epidemics and on the field assessment of rapid diagnostic tests for meningococci serogrouping. I have worked 6 years in multi-centric studies in Madagascar addressing the incidence of community-acquired neonatal infections and the spread of multi-drug resistant bacteria between different ecosystems with a special interest on mother-child transmission. Besides, I worked on whooping cough and stunting. Currently (in Shanghai), I am investigating constraints, environmental factors, and individual/collective dynamics driving the stepwise construction of the gut bacterial ecosystem.

Publications

• Huynh BT, Kermorvant-Duchemin E, Rattanak C, Randrianirina F, Seck A, Hariniaina-Ratsima E, Zo AZ, Diuof JB, Abdou AY, Goyet S, Ngo V, Lach S, Pring L, Touch S, Padget M, Sarr F, Borand L, Garin B, Collard JM, Herindrainy P, de Lauzanne A, Vray M, Delarocque-Astagneau E, Guillemot D. The high burden of community-acquired neonatal severe bacterial infections in low-middle income-countries: the pressing need of diagnostic tools at the bedside. Accepted in PLoS Medicine. PMEDICINE-D-21-0003R1 IF 2019/2020: 10.500
• Collard JM*, Sansonetti P*, Papon N. Taurine Makes Our Microbiota Stronger. Trends Endocrinol Metab. 2021 Mar 8:S1043-2760(21)00041-2. doi: 10.1016/j.tem.2021.02.006. PMID: 33707094 IF 2019/2020: 11.641
• Rakotondrasoa A*, Passet V, Herindrainy P, Garin B, Kermorvant-Duchemin E, Delarocque-Astagneau E, Guillemot D, Huynh BT, Brisse S, Collard JM. Characterization of Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates from a mother-child cohort in Madagascar. J Antimicrob Chemother. 2020 Jul 1;75(7):1736-1746. doi: 10.1093/jac/dkaa107. PMID: 32303060 2-year IF 2020: 5.247
• Vonaesch P, Morien E, Andrianonimiadana L, Sanke H, Mbecko JR, Huus K, Naharinananirina T, Godje BP, Nigatoloum SN, Vondo SS, Kandou K, Randremanana R, Rakotondrainipiana M, Mazel F, Djore SG, Gody JC, Finlay BB, Rubbo PA, Parfrey LW, Collard JM, Sansonetti P* for the Afribiota Investigators. Stunted childhood growth is associated with decompartmentalization of the gastrointestinal tract and overgrowth of oropharyngeal taxa. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2018; 115(36):E8489-E8498. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1806573115. PMID:30126990IF 2016: 9.661
• Jusot JF, Neill DR*, Bangert M, Bricio Moreno L, Gaptia Lawan K, Moussa MM, Everett D, Collard JM, Kadioglu A*. Inhaled dust and extreme temperatures are risk factors for bacterial pneumonia and meningitis. JFJ and DRN contributed equally to this work; JMC and AK are co-senior authors. J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2016 Jul 14. pii: S0091-6749(16)30616-9. doi: 10.1016/j.jaci.2016.04.062. PMID: 27523432 IF: 11.476

About

Name: Anna Cuscó

Current Affiliation: Big Data Biology Lab at Fudan University

Position: Postdoctoral researcher

Research

Research field: Animal microbiome

Research interests:

• Animal-associated microbiome, especially from the skin and gastrointestinal tract
• Long-read sequencing applied to microbial genomics and metagenomics
• Antimicrobial resistance and One health

Keywords and techniques: Animal microbiome, metagenomics, long-read sequencing, antimicrobial resistance, one-health, bioinformatics

Biosketch

Anna Cuscó is a postdoctoral researcher in the Big data Biology Lab at Fudan University since September 2021. She earned an industrial Ph.D. at Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona in 2017, in collaboration with Vetgenomics company. She holds a B.S. in Biotechnology (Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain) and a MSc in Biomedical research (Pompeu Fabra University, Spain).
During her PhD she characterized the skin microbiome of healthy dogs within body sites, breeds and environments, using different amplicon-based approaches with short- and long-read DNA sequencing technologies. After her PhD she continued on Vetgenomics, working as a Project Leader responsible for the Microbiome and Nanopore sequencing research area. Beyond being responsible for animal microbiome studies with international industrial partners, her main focus was developing new methods to apply Nanopore sequencing in microbiome and microbial genomics studies. She worked on characterizing the microbiome of low-biomass samples (e.g. skin or milk) amplifying and sequencing longer genetic markers (e.g. full-length 16S rRNA gene or the 16S-ITS-23S region of the ribosomal operon) to provide taxonomic profiling of the microbiome at the species level. She was also involved in a public funded project related to the characterization of S. pseudintermedius strains from canine pyoderma and she was a co-director of an industrial PhD project characterizing the genomes of relevant bacterial strains in several One-health scenarios.
Currently, she is focused on large-scale metagenomics, mainly working on computational microbiome analysis. The main goal of her postdoctoral project is to investigate animal-associated metagenomes at a large scale and delve deeper into the metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) of the microbes of interest. She is also involved in the organization of Microbiome Virtual International Forum.

Publications

• Cuscó A, et al. Long-read metagenomics retrieves complete single-contig bacterial genomes from canine feces. BMC Genomics (2021)
• García -Fonticoba R, …, Cusco A. The microbiota of the surface, dermis and subcutaneous tissue of dog skin. Animal microbiome (2020)
• Cuscó A, et al. Microbiota profiling with long amplicons using Nanopore sequencing: full-length 16S rRNA gene and whole rrn operon. F1000 Research (2018)
• Cuscó A, et al. Individual signatures and environmental factors shape skin microbiota in healthy dogs. Microbiome (2017)
• Viñes J, Cusco A, et al. Transmission of Similar Mcr-1 Carrying Plasmids among Different Escherichia coli Lineages Isolated from Livestock and the Farmer. Antibiotics (2021)

 

About

Name: Paul Daly

Current Affiliation: Institute of Plant Protection, Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Nanjing, 210014, China.

Position: Assistant Professor

Research

Research field: Microbe-microbe & Plant-microbe Interactions

Research interests:

• Fungal, oomycete and plant biology
• Plant pathology
• Lignin
• Bioenergy research
• Biological pretreatment
• Gene regulation and evolution
• Carbon metabolism
• CAZymes
• ‘Omics’ analysis methods
• Methods to functionally characterise genes and the use of organisms as ‘biofactories’
• Biological control of plant diseases.

Keywords and techniques: CAZymes, filamentous fungi, oomycetes, microbe-microbe & plant-microbe interactions, genomics, transcriptomics.

Biosketch

Dr. Paul Daly (who is from the south west of Ireland) obtained his PhD in plant biotechnology from the University of Dundee based at the James Hutton Institute in the UK. After working during his PhD on manipulating lignin biosynthesis in crop species with applications for bioenergy research, he moved to the University of Nottingham to work on how fungi degrade plant biomass and later continued this line of research at the Westerdijk Fungal Biodiversity Institute in the Netherlands. At the Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences (JAAS) in Nanjing, his work involves oomycetes (Pythium spp.) and functional genetics and genomics analyses to better understand the factors contributing to the virulence of oomycete plant pathogens. His work at JAAS also involves microbe-microbe interaction especially understanding the mechanisms of how microbes interact with applications for biological control of plant diseases.

Publications

• Daly, P., Chen, Y., Zhang, Q., Zhu, H., Li, J., Zhang, J., Deng, S., Wang, L.-J., Zhou, D., Tang, Z., Wei, L. (2021). Pythium myriotylum is recovered most frequently from Pythium soft-rot infected ginger rhizomes in China. Plant Disease. https://doi.org/10.1094/PDIS-05-21-0924-RE
• Daly, P., F. Cai, C. P. Kubicek, S. Jiang, M. Grujic, M. J. Rahimi, M. S. Sheteiwy, R. Giles, A. Riaz, R. P. de Vries, G. B. Akcapinar, L. Wei and I. S. Druzhinina (2021). From lignocellulose to plastics: Knowledge transfer on the degradation approaches by fungi. Biotechnology Advances 50: 107770. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biotechadv.2021.107770
• Daly, P., McClellan, C., Maluk, M., Oakey, H., Lapierre, C., Waugh, R., Stephens, J., Marshall, D., Barakate, A., Tsuji, Y., Goeminne, G., Vanholme, R., Boerjan, W., Ralph, J., Halpin, C. (2019). RNAi-
• suppression of barley caffeic acid O-methyltransferase modifies lignin despite redundancy in the gene family. Plant Biotechnology Journal. 17: pp.594-607. https://doi.org/10.1111/pbi.13001
• Benocci, T., Aguilar-Pontes, M.V., Kun, R.S., Seiboth, B., de Vries, R.P., Daly, P. (2018). ARA1 regulates not only L-arabinose but also D-galactose catabolism in Trichoderma reesei. FEBS Lett. 592, 60-70. https://doi.org/10.1002/1873-3468.12932
• van Munster, J. M., Daly, P., Delmas, S., Pullan, S. T., Blythe, M. J., Malla, S., Kokolski, M., Noltorp, E. C. M., Wennberg, K., Fetherston, R., Beniston, R., Yu, X., Dupree, P., & Archer, D. B (2014). The role of carbon starvation in the induction of enzymes that degrade plant-derived carbohydrates in Aspergillus niger. Fungal Genetics & Biology; 72, pp. 34–47. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fgb.2014.04.006

About

Name: Maurycy Daroch

Current Affiliation: Peking University; Shenzhen Graduate School; School of Environment and Energy

Position: Associate professor; PhD; dr hab.

Research

Research field: Environmental Biotechnology

Research interests :

• interface between molecular biotechnology and environmental engineering,
• extremophilic photosynthetic microorganisms,
• biological carbon capture and utilisation,
• biophotovoltaics,
• biopolymer synthesis

Keywords and techniques : cyanobacteria, extremophiles, thermophiles, hot springs, carbon fixation, carbon valorisation, DNA synthesis, DNA assembly, genomics, microbial cell factories, genome editing

Biosketch

Maurycy currently leads the cyanobacterial biotechnology group at the School of Environment and Energy and lectures on topics at the interface of biotechnology and environmental engineering. Maurycy is native to Łódź, Poland. He received MSc degree in molecular biotechnology from the Lodz University of Technology in a joint programme between the International Faculty of Engineering and the Institute of Technical Biochemistry. After completing the MSc diploma, he continued his education at the School of Biological Sciences, University of Liverpool, UK, under the Marie-Curie Early Stage Training scheme. With the completion of the PhD degree, he moved to School of Environment and Energy, Peking University Shenzhen Graduate School, China where he continues his career to this day. At his current institution Maurycy has risen through the ranks from a post-doctoral fellow to associate professor and, since 2015, runs an independent research group.

Publications

• Riaz, S., Jiang, Y., Xiao, M., You, D., Klepacz-Smółka, A., Rasul, F., Daroch, M.*, (2022). Generation of miniploid cells and improved natural transformation procedure for a model cyanobacterium Synechococcus elongatus PCC. Front. Microbiol. 1–12. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.959043 
• Riaz S, Xiao M, Chen P, Li M, Cui Y, Daroch M*. (2021) The genome copy number of the thermophilic cyanobacterium Thermosynechococcus elongatus E542 is controlled by growth phase and nutrient availability. Appl Environ Microbiol 87:e02993-20. https://doi.org/10.1128/AEM.02993-20. 
• Liang Y, Tang J, Luo Y, Kaczmarek MB, Li X., Daroch M.* (2019) Thermosynechococcus as a thermophilic photosynthetic microbial cell factory for CO2 utilisation. Bioresource Technology 278 255–265, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2019.01.089 
• Klepacz-Smolka A., Shah MR., Jiang Y., Zhong Y., Chen P., Pietrzyk D., Szelag R., Ledakowicz S., Daroch M.* (2024) Microalgae are not an umbrella solution for power industry wasteabatement but could play a role in their valorization, Critical Reviews in Biotechnology, https://doi.org/10.1080/07388551.2023.2284644 
• Jiang Y., Tang J., Liu X., Daroch M.* (2023) Polyphasic characterization of a novel hot-spring cyanobacterium Thermocoleostomius sinensis gen et sp. nov. and genomic insights into its carbon concentration mechanism. Front. Microbiol. 14:1176500. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2023.1176500

About

Current Affiliation: Pasteur Institute Shanghai

Center of Microbes Development and Health in Immunity and Pediatric Infectious Diseases Unit

Position: Post Doctoral Researcher

Research

Research field: Neonate immunity /NEC Disease /Gut Microbiota / Neonate Innate like B cells

Research interest: 

• Metagenomic
• Single cell RNA sequencing
• Cytometry
• Cell culture
• mAb production

Biosketch

Graduated in 2017 of a PhD in immunology in France, I worked on MHCII antigen presentation by dendritic cells during experimental cerebral malaria (ECM). I profiled the first MCH II immunopeptidome presented by dendritic cells to CD4 T cells. I engineered reporter CD4 T‐cell hybridomas specific for the most prominent epitope. I found that cDC1 were more potent than cDC2 for presenting MHC II Plasmodium antigens. In vivo ablation of cDC1 protected mice from ECM and demonstrated that cDC1 promoted the differentiation of parasite‐specific IFNγ+ TNF+ Th1 cells, to the expense of more regulatory IL‐10+CD4 Tcells.

I obtained my Post-doctoral degree at the Sino-French Hoffmann institute (Guangzhou) in December 2020. During two years and a half, I conducted projects on Drosophila innate immunity in relation with bacterial Outer Membrane Vesicles (OMV).

I developed a technic to produce OMV secreted by Gram(-) bacteria such as Serratia marcescens one of the most potent pathogen in Drosophila since one bacterium kill within 24h. I investigated the role of Serratia OMV in Drosophila. I

As a second project, I characterized the role of GBP in Drosophila immune responses.

Since 2021, I explore the influence of natural polyreactive antibodies on shaping newborn microbial colonization. Gut microbiota colonization starts after birth with few seeds with limited microbial complexity and become stable at around 2-3 years old. Several factors such as birth route, diet or antibiotic treatments contribute to microbiota diversity. The early step of colonization is crucial in microbiota diversity and important in maintaining healthy state. Indeed, disturbing gut colonization induce dysbiosis and participate in disease development.

Antibodies (Ab) secreted at mucosal sites participate in microbial diversity by inhibiting pathobionts growth. Our group identified a new population of Innate like B cells, with a biased Ig repertoire and in the absence of somatic hypermutations. These cells are responsible for the production of high amounts of natural polyreactive IgM antibodies in newborns. Ig polyreactivity is associated with specific features, including microbiota recognition. The influence of these natural IgM in shaping gut colonization at early steps of life has not been investigated yet.

Publications

2020 Journal of immunology (IF= 4,886)

• Plasmodium yoelii Uses a TLR3-Dependent Pathway to Achieve Mammalian Host Parasitism

Tarun Keswan, Delphine Delcroix-Genete, Fabien Herbert, Ines Leleu, Claire Lambert, Marion Draheim, Sophie Salome-Desnoulez, Jean Michel Saliou, Pierre-André Cazenave, Olivier Silvie, Jacques Roland, Sylviane Pied

2017 EMBO molecular medicine (IF= 10.293)

• Profiling MHC II immunopeptidome of blood-stage malaria reveals that cDC1 control the functionality of parasite-specific CD4 T cells

Marion Draheim, Myriam F Wlodarczyk, Karine Crozat, Jean-Michel Saliou, Tchilabalo Dilezitoko Alayi, Stanislas Tomavo, Ali Hassan, Anna Salvioni, Claudia Demarta-Gatsi, John Sidney, Alessandro Sette, Marc Dalod, Antoine Berry, Olivier Silvie, Nicolas Blanchard

About

Name: Jan Drewes, Dr. rer. nat.

Current Affiliation: Institute of Brain and Psychological Sciences, Sichuan Normal University, Chengdu, China

Position: Professor

Research

Research field: Human Cognitive Neuroscience

Research interests:

• Vision,
• Perception,
• Timing in the brain

Keywords and techniques: eye tracking, EEG, binocular rivalry, psychophysics

Biosketch

Master’s degree in Computer Science 2002, followed by a PhD in Computational Neuroscience and Experimental Psychology 2006. PostDoc Positions at the French National Research Center (CNRS, Marseille and Toulouse), Giessen University (Germany), York University (Toronto, Canada), Trento University (Italy), and Chemnitz University of Technology (Germany). Professor at the IBPS since 2020.

Publications

• Drewes, J and VanRullen, R, 2011. “This Is the Rhythm of Your Eyes: The Phase of Ongoing Electroencephalogram Oscillations Modulates Saccadic Reaction Time.” The Journal of Neuroscience 31, no. 12: 4698–4708. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.4795-10.2011.
• Drewes, J; Zhu, W; Wutz, A; and Melcher, D, 2015. “Dense Sampling Reveals Behavioral Oscillations in Rapid Visual Categorization.” Scientific Reports 5: 16290. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep16290.
• Drewes, J; Goren, G; Zhu, W; and Elder, JH, 2016. “Recurrent Processing in the Formation of Shape Percepts.” The Journal of Neuroscience 36, no. 1: 185–92. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2347-15.2016.
• Drewes, J; Zhu, W; and Melcher, D, 2020. “The Optimal Spatial Noise for Continuous Flash Suppression Masking Is Pink.” Scientific Reports 10, no. 1: 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-63888-7.
• Drewes, J; Feder, S; and Einhäuser, W, 2021. “Gaze During Locomotion in Virtual Reality and the Real World.” Frontiers in Neuroscience 15 (2021). https://doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2021.656913

About

Name: Irina S. Druzhinina

Current Affiliation: Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China

Position: Professor

Research

Research field: Fungal Genomics, Environmental Microbiology, Microbial Diversity, Molecular Evolution

Research interests:

• Biological control of fungal pests
• Biological degradation of synthetic polymers
• DNA BarCoding of microorganisms
• Fungal – bacterial interactions
• Fungal – plant interactions
• Fungal biotechnology
• Fungal diversity
• Fungal fitness and communities
• Genomics of fungi
• Heterologous protein production
• Horizontal gene transfer
• Hydrophobins and other fungal surface-active proteins
• Insect microbiomes
• Metagenomics
• Microbial ecology
• Molecular evolution and phylogeny
• Mycoparasitism and fungal-fungal interactions
• Phenotype profiles
• Plant growth promotion
• Plastic degradation
• Proteomics
• Soil microbiology
• Trichoderma, mycoparasitism
• Tropical ecology

Keywords and techniques: Molecular biology, molecular evolution, ecophysiological profiling, genomics, proteomics, transcriptomics, DNA BarCoding, scientific illustration, field research.

Biosketch

Irina S. Druzhinina is currently a full professor of Microbiology, College of Resources and Environmental Sciences, Nanjing Agricultural University (NAU), Nanjing, China, the head of the International Committee on Trichoderma Taxonomy (www.Trichoderma.info), member of the International Committee of Taxonomy of Fungi, IUMS, the editor of the Applies and Environmental Microbiology journal (AEM) of American Society for Microbiology (ASM).

Before moving to China in 2019, Irina ran the group of Microbiology and Applied Genomics in TU Wien (Vienna, Austria), where she focused on genomics, microbial identification, fungal DNA Barcoding, diversity and molecular evolution of Trichoderma and other hypocrealean fungi. The group maintained an extensive collection of industrially relevant microorganisms. The NAU’s newly established Fungal Genomics Laboratory (www.FungiG.org) continues the research on the diversity, DNA barcoding, molecular evolution, and taxonomy of all fungi in China. Since a few years, Irina’s group is deeply involved in the whole genus genomic project of Trichoderma (together with JGI, DOE, CA, USA). In particular, the group is interested in the function and production of fungal surface-active proteins (hydrophobins, cerato-platanins) and their role in ecological adaptations. Moreover, Irina’s group is experienced in the ecophysiological profiling of fungi and fungal communities using phenotype microarrays powered by novel artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms.

The new research avenue of the group is the investigation of microorganisms capable of plastic degradation. The combination of the unique know-how on surface-active proteins, fungal genomics and diversity, and skills in biotechnology (heterologous protein production, gene engineering) allows Irina and her colleagues to target the improvement of the biological degradation of synthetic polymers in soil using plant-beneficial fungi.

Irina Druzhinina is also a dedicated university professor with almost two decades of teaching experience in Austria and China. She developed lecture and laboratory courses on microbiology, applied bioinformatics, fungal genomics, and molecular evolution for under- and postgraduates, supervised four bachelor, fifteen master, and ten Ph.D. studies completed in the TU Wien, and is now supervising several master and Ph.D. candidates in NAU.

Irina has authored more than 140 peer-reviewed publications and 13 books and book chapters; h-index – 60.

Publications

1. Zhao Z, Cai F, Gao R, Ding M, Jiang S, Chen P, et al. At least three families of hyphosphere small secreted cysteine‐rich proteins can optimize surface properties to a moderately hydrophilic state suitable for fungal attachment. Environmental Microbiology. 2021.

2. Daly P, Cai F, Kubicek CP, Jiang S, Grujic M, Rahimi MJ, et al. From lignocellulose to plastics: Knowledge transfer on the degradation approaches by fungi. Biotechnology Advances. 2021:107770.

3. Cai F, Druzhinina IS. In honor of John Bissett: authoritative guidelines on molecular identification of Trichoderma. Fungal Diversity. 2021;107(1):1-69.

4. Cai F, Gao R, Zhao Z, Ding M, Jiang S, Yagtu C, et al. Evolutionary compromises in fungal fitness: hydrophobins can hinder the adverse dispersal of conidiospores and challenge their survival. The ISME journal. 2020;14(10):2610-24.

5. Druzhinina IS, Seidl-Seiboth V, Herrera-Estrella A, Horwitz BA, Kenerley CM, Monte E, et al. Trichoderma: the genomics of opportunistic success. Nature Reviews Microbiology. 2011;9(10):749-59.​​​​​​

About

Name: Francesco Faiola

Current Affiliation: Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing

Position: Professor

Research

Research field: Stem Cell Toxicology

Research interest:

• Stem cell toxicology

Keywords and techniques : Stem cell differentiation, in vitro toxicology, environmental pollution, drug safety.

Biosketch

Francesco Faiola is the leader of the Stem Cell Toxicology Group at the Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences (RCEES), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Beijing, China, since 2014. Dr. Faiola obtained his B.S./M.S. in Industrial Chemistry from the University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Italy, in 1998, and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of California, Riverside (UCR), in 2006. Then, he pursued his first postdoctoral experience in Cancer Biology at UCR until 2010, and his second one in Pluripotent Stem Cell Biology at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, before joining RCEES. Dr. Faiola has published more than 60 research articles in prestigious scientific journals including Nature, PNAS, Stem Cell Reports, and Environmental Science & Technology. In addition, he was selected for the CAS “One Hundred Talent” program, in 2015, and recognized as a “Special Foreign Talent” by CAS, in 2019.

Dr. Faiola’s group focuses on the assessment of environmental pollutants’ health risks, particularly during the early stages of human development, by implementing a stem cell-based toxicology research platform. They have already established several stem cell toxicology models, in 2D and 3D settings, for embryonic, cardiac, hepatic, lung, pancreatic, skin, and neural developmental/functional toxicity evaluations. Furthermore, his lab employs several bioinformatics tools addressing changes in gene expression and lineage fate decisions, as well as molecular biology techniques, to dissect the underlying molecular mechanisms of chemical toxicity, and potential links to human diseases. The research systems they established have been widely utilized in the fields of environmental toxicology and drug safety.

Publications

• Yael Costa^#, Junjun Ding^#, Thorold W. Theunissen^#, Francesco Faiola^#, Timothy A. Hore, Pavel V. Shliaha, Miguel Fidalgo, Arven Saunders, Moyra Lawrence, Sabine Dietmann, Satyabrata Das, Dana N. Levasseur, Zhe Li, Mingjiang Xu, Wolf Reik, José C. R. Silva*, Jianlong Wang*. NANOG-dependent function of TET1 and TET2 in establishment of pluripotency. Nature. 2013, 495(7441), 370-374.
• Francesco Faiola^#,*, Nuoya Yin^#, Miguel Fidalgo, Xin Huang, Arven Saunders, Junjun Ding, Diana Guallar, Baoyen Dang, and Jianlong Wang*. NAC1 regulates somatic cell reprogramming by controlling Zeb1 and E-cadherin Expression. Stem Cell Reports. 2017, 9 (3), 913-926.
• Shuyu Liu, Renjun Yang, Yongjiu Chen, Xingchen Zhao, Shaokun Chen, Xuezhi Yang, Zhanwen Cheng, Bowen Hu, Xiaoxing Liang, Nuoya Yin, Qian Liu, Hailin Wang, Sijin Liu, Francesco Faiola*. Development of human lung induction models for air pollutants’ toxicity assessment. Environmental Science & Technology. 2021, 55(4), 2440-2451.
• Renjun Yang, Shuyu Liu, Xiaoxing Liang, Nuoya Yin, Ting Ruan, Linshu Jiang, Francesco Faiola*. F-53B and PFOS treatments skew human embryonic stem cell in vitro cardiac differentiation towards epicardial cells by partly disrupting the WNT signaling pathway. Environmental Pollution. 2020 Jun; 261: 114153.
• Francesco Faiola*, Nuoya Yin, Xinglei Yao, Guibin Jiang. The rise of Stem Cell Toxicology. Environmental Science & Technology. 2015, 49 (10), 5847-5848.

About

Name: Stefania Ferraro

Current Affiliation: University of Electronic Science and Technology of Chengdu (UESTC)

Position: Associate Professor

Research

Research field: Human Cognitive Neuroscience

Research interest: 

• chronic pain
• disorders of consciousness

Keywords and techniques: chronic pain and disorders of consciousness, magnetic resonance imaging, functional magnetic resonance imaging, diffusion tensor imaging, stereo-EEG.

Biosketch

Since April 2020, I am employed at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of Chengdu (UESTC) as Associate Professor at the Neuscan Lab, directed by Prof. Benjamin Becker. Here, I am developing my keen interest in the neural bases of chronic pain employing structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging techniques. Specifically, I am testing the role of the mesocorticolimbic abnormalities in the chronicization of pain with the aim in mind to develop new approaches in the prevention and treatment of this condition, which represents the major cause of disability and suffering across the world population.Before joining the Neuscan Lab, I worked for about 11 years as a Researcher in the Neuroimaging Laboratory in the Neuroradiology Department of the IRCCS Neurological Institute Carlo Besta (Milano-Italy), where I gained significant expertise in the application of conventional and advanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) protocols to study several neurological diseases (such as cluster headache, medication overuse headache, disorders of consciousness, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Huntington’s disease, and spinocerebellar ataxia) with a specific focus on chronic pain and consciousness.

Publications

• Stefania Ferraro, Benjamin Klugah-Brown, Christopher R Tench, Shuxia Yao, Anna Nigri, Greta Demichelis, Chiara Pinardi, Maria Grazia Bruzzone, Benjamin Becker. Dysregulated anterior insula reactivity as robust functional biomarker for chronic pain – meta-analytic evidence from neuroimaging studies. MedRxiv, March 2021. Under revision
• Stefania Ferraro, Luca Giani, Anna Nigri, Maria Grazia Bruzzone , Chiara Pinardi, Greta Demichelis, Jean Paul Medina, Luisa Chiapparini, Benjamin Becker, Massimo Leone, Alberto Proietti. Mesocorticolimbic system abnormalities in chronic cluster headache patients: a neural signature? – Under revision
• Leone M, Ferraro S, Proietti Cecchini A; The Human Hypothalamus – The Handbook of Clinical Neurology (volume IV.49); 2021
• Ferraro S, van Ackeren MJ, Mai R, Tassi L, Cardinale F, Nigri A, Bruzzone MG, D’Incerti L, Hartmann T, Weisz N, Collignon O; Stereotactic electroencephalography in humans reveals multisensory signal in early visual and auditory cortices; Cortex, 2020.
• Ferraro S, Nigri A, Nava S, Rosazza C, Sattin D, Rossi SD, Porcu L, Bruzzone MG, Marotta G, Benti R, Leonardi M, D’Incerti L. On behalf of Coma Research Center, Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Neurologico “Carlo Besta”, Milan; Degree of inter-hemispheric disconnection predicts vegetative state from minimal conscious state in disorder of consciousness patients irrespective from etiology; Journal of Neurotrauma, 2019;

About

Name: Flora Gordillo-Martínez

Affiliation: University of Saint Joseph

Current Position: Postdoctoral Researcher

Research

Research field: Animal Behavior and Neurophysiology

Research interests: 

• Applied physiology
• Behaviour and genomic tools to the environmental and pharmacological screening process.

Keywords and techniques: Neurophysiology, zebrafish, behaviour, screening, and hearing, behavioural assessments, auditory evoked potentials, ELISA, immunohistochemistry

Biosketch

Flora Gordillo Martinez (ISE-USJ) is a Postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Science and Environment at University of Saint Joseph (ISE-USJ, Macao). BSc (Hons) in Biology, MSc in Biomedical Research, and PhD in Molecular Biology and Biomedicine, all at the University of Seville (US). Participated in several research projects on aged-related diseases. Identification and study of novel autophagy modulators compounds from Traditional Chinese Medicine for cancer treatment at the State Key Laboratory of Quality Research in Chinese Medicine at Macau University of Science and Technology (MUST, Macao). Molecular and Cell Biology studies in vascular calcification at Guangzhou Medical University (GMU, Guangzhou). Recent research focused on acquired hearing loss in the zebrafish model, mechanisms underlying aging and noise effects on the vertebrate auditory system. Author or co-author of about ten scientific articles published in international journals.

Publications

• Chen, Z. *; Gordillo-Martinez, F. *; Jiang, L.; He, P.; Hong, W.; Wei, X.; Staines, K.A.; Macrae, V.E.; Zhang, C.; Yu, D.; Fu, X.; and Zhu, D. Zinc ameliorates human aortic valve calcification through GPR39 mediated ERK1/2 signaling pathway. Cardiovascular Research. 2020 Apr 7.
• Qu, Y.Q.*; Gordillo-Martínez, F. *; Law, B.Y.K.; Han, Y.; Wu, A; Zeng, W.; Lam, W.K.; Ho, C.; Mok, S.W.F.; He, H.Q.; Wong, V.K.W.; and Wang, R. 2-Aminoethoxydiphenylborane sensitizes anti-tumor effect of bortezomib via suppression of calcium-mediated autophagy. Cell Death & Disease. 2018 Mar 2;9(3):361.
• Utrilla, J.C. *; Gordillo-Martínez, F. *; Gómez-Pascual, A.; Fernández-Santos, J.M.; Garnacho, C.; Vázquez-Román, V.; Morillo-Bernal, J.; García-Marín, R.; Jiménez-García, A. and Martín-Lacave, I. Comparative study of the primary cilia in thyrocytes of adult mammals. Journal of Anatomy. 2015 Oct; 227(4):550-60.
• de Seabra Rodrigues Dias, I.R.; Mok, S.W.F.; Gordillo-Martínez, F.; Khan, I.; Hsiao, W. W. L.; Law, B.Y.K.; Wong, V.K.W.; and Liu, L. The Calcium-Induced Regulation in the Molecular and Transcriptional Circuitry of Human Inflammatory Response and Autoimmunity. Frontiers in Pharmacology. 2018 Jan 8;8:962.
• Law, B.Y.K.; Gordillo-Martínez, F.; Qu, Y.Q.; Zhang, N.; Xu, S.W.; Coghi, P.S.; Mok, S.W.F.; Guo, J.; Zhang, W.; Leung, E.L.H.; Fan, X.X.; Wu, A.G.; Chan, W.K.; Yao, X.J.; Wang, J.R.; Liu, L. and Wong, V.K.W. Thalidezine, A Novel AMPK Activator, Eliminates Apoptosis-resistant Cancer Cells Through Energy-mediated Autophagic Cell Death. Oncotarget. 2017 May 2;8(18):30077-30091.

About

Name: Małgorzata A. Garstka

Current Affiliation: The Second Affiliated Hospital of Xi’an Jiaotong University

Position: Professor

Research

Research Field: Immunology / Tumor Immunology / Endocrinology

Research Interests :

• Antigen presentation and T cell-mediated immune response in type 1 and type 2 diabetes
• Immune response in diabetes-associated cancers
• Early diagnosis of diabetes

Keywords and techniques: antigen presentation, diabetes, autoimmunity, tumor immunology, method development, protein production and purification, flow cytometry, MHC multimers

Biosketch

Malgorzata A. Garstka (高霞), is a professor in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and Internal Medicine, and doctoral supervisor. Malgorzata received M.Sc. degree in Molecular Biotechnology and Technical Biochemistry from the Lodz University of Technology in a joint program between the International Faculty of Engineering and the Institute of Technical Biochemistry. She was awarded Ph.D. in Biochemistry at Jacob University, Bremen, Germany, and received postdoctoral at the Leiden University Medical Center and the Netherlands Cancer Institute. She is a professor at the Scientific Research Center Laboratory of the Second Affiliated Hospital of Xi’an Jiaotong University and the Institute of Cancer and Immunology of the Precision Medicine Research Institute since September 2016. She was selected into the “Hundred Talents Program” of Shaanxi Province, Xi’an City Talent and the Young Top Talents of Xi’an Jiaotong University Support Program.

Publications

• Amarajeewa AWP, Özcan A, Mukhtiar A, Ren X, Wang Q, Ozbek P, Garstka MA*, Serçinoğlu O* (2024). Polymorphism in F pocket affects peptide selection and stability of type 1 diabetes-associated HLA-B39 allotypes. Eur J Immunol. e2350683. doi: 10.1002/eji.202350683. 
• Ren X, Amarajeewa AWP, Jayasinghe MDT, Garstka MA* (2024). Differences in F pocket impact on HLA I genetic associations with autoimmune diabetes. Front Immunol, 15, https://doi.org/10.3389/fimmu.2024.1342335.  
• Luimstra J.J^*, Garstka M.A.*^, Roex M.C.J., Redeker A., Janssen G.M.C, van Veelen P.A., Arens R., Falkenburg J.H.F, Jacques Neefjes*, Huib Ovaa* (2018). A rapid and flexible MHC class I multimer loading system for large-scale detection of antigen-specific T cell responses. J Exp Med 215(5): 1493-1504, https://doi.org/10.1084/jem.20180156.  
• Garstka M., Fish A., Celie P.H.N., Joosten R.P., Janssen G.M.C., Berlin I., Hoppes R., Stadnik M., Janssen L., Ovaa H., van Veelen P.A., Perrakis A., and Neefjes J. (2015) The first step of peptide selection in antigen presentation by MHC class I molecules. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A., 112:1505-10, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1416543112.  
• Garstka M.A., Fritzsche S., Lenart I., Hein Z., Jankevicius G., Boyle L.H., Elliott T., Trowsdale J., Antoniou A.N., Zacharias M., and Springer S. (2011). Tapasin dependence of major histocompatibility complex class I molecules correlates with their conformational flexibility. FASEB J., 25: 3989-98, https://doi.org/10.1096/fj.11-190249.

* Joint first authors

^ Corresponding authors

About

Name: Esther González-Almela

Current Affiliation: Guangzhou Regenerative Medicine and Health Guangdong Laboratory (GRMH-GDL)

Position: Associate Researcher

Research

Research field: Virology and Super Resolution Microscopy

Research Interests :

• Virus/RNA/chromatin architecture
• eukaryotic translation

Keywords: HSV-1, virus, chromatin architecture, RNA, translation, transcription, STORM, DNA-PAINT, oligoSTORM, oligopaints.

Biosketch

Dr. Esther González Almela, Associate Professor at the Guangzhou Regenerative Medicine and Health Guangdong Laboratory (GRMH-GDL). She has a doctorate in Molecular Biosciences, with a specialty in virology, from the Universidad Autonoma de Madrid (Spain). Her work as a virologist has taken her to different universities such as the University of Oxford (UK) and the University of Johannes Gutenberg, in Mainz (Germany). Since 2019, Dr. González has been working at the GRMH-GDL research center, an international research institute founded by the Guangdong government with more than 20 different teams made up of more than 1200 scientists. Specializing in Molecular Virology, her research focuses on the study of viral infection mechanisms and their effects on human cells.

Publications

• Garcia-Moreno M, Noerenberg M, Ni S, Järvelin AI, González-Almela E, Lenz CE, Bach-Pages M, Cox V, Avolio R, Davis T, Hester S, Sohier TJM, Li B, Heikel G, Michlewski G, Sanz MA, Carrasco L, Ricci EP, Pelechano V, Davis I, Fischer B, Mohammed S, Castello A. System-wide Profiling of RNA-Binding Proteins Uncovers Key Regulators of Virus Infection. Mol Cell. 2019 Feb. doi: 10.1016/j.molcel.2019.01.017.

• Sanz MA, González-Almela E, Garcia Moreno M, Marina AI, Carrasco L. A Viral RNA Motif Involved in Signalling the Initiation of Translation on non-AUG codons. RNA. 2019 Jan. doi: 10.1261/rna.068858.118.

• González-Almela E, Williams H, Sanz MA, Carrasco L. The Initiation Factors eIF2, eIF2A, eIF2D, eIF4A, and eIF4G Are Not Involved in Translation Driven by Hepatitis C Virus IRES in Human Cells. Front Microbiol . 2018 Feb 13;9:207. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2018.00207. eCollection 2018.

• Carrasco L, Sanz MA, González-Almela E. The Regulation of Translation in Alphavirus-Infected Cells. Viruses. 2018 Feb 8;10(2). pii: E70. doi: 10.3390/v10020070. Review.

• Sanz MA, González Almela E, Carrasco L. Translation of Sindbis Subgenomic mRNA is Independent of eIF2, eIF2A and eIF2D. Sci Rep. 2017 Feb 27;7:43876. doi: 10.1038/srep43876

About

Name: Magdalena Joanna Górska (马格达)

Current Affiliation: Nutritional Epidemiology Institute and School of Public Health, Tianjin Medical University, Tianjin, China

Position: PhD at Tianjin Medical University

Research

Research field: Public Health and Preventive Medicine

Research interest: 

• chronic diseases
• telemedicine
• radiology
• new technologies – medical devices

Keywords and techniques: diabetes mellitus and prediabetes, obesity, gerontology, digital health, atherosclerosis, dietary patterns, risk factors, cohort study

Biosketch

Magdalena J. Górska (马格达) is a Polish researcher based in Shanghai.
She obtained two master’s degrees in medical sciences at The Poznań University of Medical Sciences, Poland and management sciences at Poznań University of Economics and Business, Poland, after that she achieved a PhD in Medicine, major in Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Tianjin Medical University, China. Following current trends in healthcare, she focused her research on chronic diseases and telehealth capabilities. Her Doctoral dissertation investigated healthy lifestyle factors and the risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus and prediabetes, among adults in China. During the same time, she started to develop an interest in digital solutions for medicine, including telemedicine and blockchain, which currently is her main work object.

Publications

• LIU Y, WANG X, ZHANG Q, MENG G, LIU L, WU H, GU Y, ZHANG S, WANG Y, ZHANG T, GORSKA MJ, et al, Relationship between dietary patterns and carotid atherosclerosis among people aged 50 years or older: a population-based study in China, Front. Nutr, 2021.
• ZHANG S, GU Y, BIAN S, GORSKA MJ, et al, Dietary patterns and risk of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease in adults: A prospective cohort study, Clin Nutr., 2021; 40 (10);
• HENG J, WANG X, GAN S, ZHANG Q, MENG G, LIU L, WU H, GU Y, ZHANG S, WANG Y, GORSKA MJ, et al, Association of Appendicular Skeletal Muscle to Trunk Fat Ratio with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus in Older Adults, Gerontology. 2021 30;1-8.

About

Name: Alexandre Grassart

Current Affiliation : Institut Pasteur of Shanghai- CAS

Position : Principal Investigator and Professor

Research

Research Field:  Bioengineering, Cell Biology, Microbiology

Research interest: 

• Investigating host-pathogen interactions
• Shigella infection
• Understanding spatio-temporal organization of intestinal microbiota
• Understanding how mechanical forces play a role in infection
• Developing microfluidics systems applied to microbiology studies
• Developing organ on chip platforms applied to microbiology studies

Keywords and techniques: Gut, shigella, mechanobiology, microbiota, host pathogen interactions

Biosketch

Alexandre GRASSART is a French citizen who graduated in 2010 from the University Paris-Saclay and Institut Pasteur (France). He did a post-doctoral training at UC Berkeley (USA) during which he gained a recognized expertise in the field of Cell Biology and Bioengineering. Then he joined the Institut Pasteur (France) in 2014 where he investigated the mechanobiology of intestinal infection caused by Shigella. In 2020, he established the lab of Bioengineering and Microbiology at the Institute Pasteur of Shanghai-CAS. His team is currently developing new approaches based on microfluidics for better understanding the role of microbiota and mechanical forces in regulating host-microbial interactions in health and disease.

Publications

1. Grassart A^#, Valérie Malardé, Gobaa S, Anna Sartori-Rupp, Jordan Kerns, Katia Karalis, Benoit Marteyn, Sansonetti P and Sauvonnet N^#. Cell Host & Microbe (2019) Sep 11;26(3):435-444. Bioengineered human organ-on-Chip reveals intestinal microenvironment and mechanical forces impacting Shigella infection. # Corresponding authors

2. Ferrari M, Malardé V, Grassart A, Salavessa L, Nigro G, Decorps-Leclere S, Masson V, Arras G, Loew D, Rhode J, Sansonetti Pj, Sauvonnet N. Shigella flexneri induces a global blockage in host cell intracellular transport leading to cell and tissue disorganization. PNAS. (2019) Jul 2; 116(27):13582-13591.

3. Bertot L*, Grassart A*, Lagache T*, Nardi G*, Basquin C, Olivo-Marin JC and Sauvonnet N. Cell reports (2018) Feb 6;(22):1574-1588. Quantitative imaging and statistical analysis of the dynamics of clathrin-dependent and -independent endocytosis reveal a differential role of endophilinA2 in dynamin2 recruitment. *These authors contributed equally to this work

4. Lagache T, Grassart A, Faklaris O, Sauvonnet N, Danglot L, Olivo-Marin JC. SODA: A statistical framework to analyze the spatial organization of molecules in multi-color super-resolution microscopy. Nature Communications (2018) Feb 15 ;9(1):698.

5. Grassart A*, Cheng AT*, Sun Hae Hong, Fan Zhang, Nathan Zenzer, Yongmei Feng, David M. Briner, Gregory D. Davis, Dmitry Malkov, Drubin DG. Actin and dynamin2 dynamics and interplay during clathrin mediated endocytosis. J Cell Biol. (2014) Jun 205 (5):721-735. *These authors contributed equally to this work.

About

Name: Carlos Ibáñez

Current Affiliation:

• McGovern Institute For Brain Research, School of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China
• Chinese Institute for Brain Research, Beijing, China
• Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden

Position: Professor / Principal Investigator

Research

Research field: Neuroscience and Metabolism

Research Interests :

• Growth Factor Receptor signaling and biology in nervous system and metabolism: neurodegeneration, dementia and obesity
• Death receptor signaling and physiology in neurodegeneration
• Metabolic regulation by activin receptors ALK4 and ALK7
• Cellular plasticity and diversity of adipose tissues

Keywords and techniques : Neurotrophins, TGF-beta, growth factor receptors, signal transduction, intracellular trafficking, amyloid precursor protein, Alzheimer’s disease, adipose tissue, adipogenesis, thermogenesis, obesity

Biosketch

Carlos Ibáñez studied biology at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. His PhD work was conducted at the Leloir Institute (formerly known as Fundacion Campomar) under the direction of Carlos Frasch. Carlos Ibanez did postdoctoral studies at the Karolinska Institute (KI), Sweden, under the direction of the late Håkan Persson. In 1996, he became Professor in Neuroscience at the Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. Information about his KI laboratory can be found at www.carlosibanezlab.se. Since 2004, Carlos Ibanez is a member of the Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute, the body that awards the Nobel Prize in Physiology Or Medicine. In the Fall of 2012, Carlos Ibanez became jointly appointed as Professor at the Department of Physiology, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore (NUS). Information about his NUS laboratory can be found at www.carlosibanezlab.se/NUS. In 2020, he left NUS to join the McGovern Institute at the School of Life Sciences in Peking University and the Chinese Institute for Brain Research in Beijing, China, to build a new research group. Information about his Beijing laboratory can be found at www.carlosibanezlab.se/PKU. With a focus on growth factor receptor signalling, the aim of his research is the discovery of novel biological principles and mechanisms of general importance for nervous system development and metabolic regulation.

Publications

• Goh, ETH., Lin, Z., Young Ahn, B., Lopes-Rodrigues, V., Ha Dang, N., Salim, S., Berger, B., Dymock, B., Senger^, D.L. and Ibáñez, C.F. (2018) A small molecule targeting the transmembrane domain of death receptor p75^NTRinduces melanoma cell death and reduces tumor growth. Cell Chemical Biology, 25, 1485–1494.
• Tann, J.Y., Wong, L.-W., Sajikumar, S. and Ibáñez, C.F. (2019) Abnormal TDP-43 function impairs activity-dependent BDNF secretion, synaptic plasticity and cognitive behavior through altered Sortilin splicing. The EMBO Journal, 10.15252/embj.2018100989.
• Göngrich, C., Krapacher, F., Munguba, H., Fernandez-Suarez, D., Andersson, A., Hjerling-Leffler^, J. and Ibáñez C.F. (2019) ALK4 coordinates extracellular and intrinsic signals to regulate development of cortical somatostatin interneurons. J. Cell Biol. 219 (1): doi.org/10.1083/jcb.201905002
• Marmol-Carrasco, P., Krapacher, F. and Ibáñez, C.F. (2020) Control of brown adipose tissue adaptation to nutrient stress by the activin receptor ALK7. eLife 2020;9:e54721
• Chenju Yi^, C., Goh, K.Y., Wong, L.-W., Ramanujan, A., Tanaka, K., Sajikumar, S. and. Ibáñez, C.F. (2020) Inactive variants of death receptor p75^NTR reduce Alzheimer’s neuropathology by interfering with APP internalization. The EMBO Journal, 40:e104450.

About

Name: Jauch  Ralf

Current Affiliation: School of Biomedical Sciences, University of Hong Kong

Position:  Associate Professor 

Research

Research field:  Stem Cells and Synthetic Biology 

Research interest: 

• Stem Cells
• Aging
• Engineering Biology 

Keywords and techniques: iPSCs, iNSCs, protein engineering, pioneer factors 

Biosketch

Ralf Jauch is an Associate Professor at the School of Biomedical Sciences/Faculty of Medicine of the University of Hong Kong, specializing in protein science and stem cell engineering. He is also a Principal Investigator at the Centre for Translational Stem Cell Biology. Ralf completed his undergraduate studies in his hometown Jena, Germany and the University of Manchester, UK. He obtained his PhD degree from the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen. His career has taken him to various research institutions in Asia, including the Genome Institute of Singapore and later to the Guangzhou Institutes of Biomedicine and Health where he helped to set up the GIBH – Max Planck Center for Regenerative Medicine. Ralf’s research focuses on developing advanced stem cell models to investigate and revert aging and related diseases. Part of this work critically relies on engineered transcription factors. More recently, he became interested in evolutionary stem cell biology.

Publications

• Weng M, Hu H, Graus MS, Tan DS, Gao Y, Ren S, Ho DHH, Langer J, Holzner M, Huang Y, Ling GS, Lai CSW, Francois M, Jauch R (2023) An engineered Sox17 induces somatic to neural stem cell fate transitions independently from pluripotency reprogramming. Sci Adv 9: eadh2501 
• Tan DS, Cheung SL, Gao Y, Weinbuch M, Hu H, Shi L, Ti SC, Hutchins AP, Cojocaru V, Jauch R (2023) The homeodomain of Oct4 is a dimeric binder of methylated CpG elements. Nucleic Acids Res 51: 1120-1138 
• Hu H, Ho DHH, Tan DS, MacCarthy CM, Yu CH, Weng M, Scholer HR, Jauch R (2023) Evaluation of the determinants for improved pluripotency induction and maintenance by engineered SOX17. Nucleic Acids Res 51: 8934-8956 
• Tan DS, Chen Y, Gao Y, Bednarz A, Wei Y, Malik V, Ho DH, Weng M, Ho SY, Srivastava Y, Velychko S, Yang X, Fan L, Kim J, Graumann J, Stormo GD, Braun T, Yan J, Scholer HR, Jauch R (2021) Directed Evolution of an Enhanced POU Reprogramming Factor for Cell Fate Engineering. Mol Biol Evol 38: 2854-2868 
• Malik V, Glaser LV, Zimmer D, Velychko S, Weng M, Holzner M, Arend M, Chen Y, Srivastava Y, Veerapandian V, Shah Z, Esteban MA, Wang H, Chen J, Scholer HR, Hutchins AP, Meijsing SH, Pott S, Jauch R (2019) Pluripotency reprogramming by competent and incompetent POU factors uncovers temporal dependency for Oct4 and Sox2. Nat Commun 10: 3477 

About

Name: KAPPES Ferdinand

Current Affiliation: Duke Kunshan University 

Position: Associate Professor of Biology 

Research

Research field: Chromatin and Epigenetics, Protein Biochemistry

Research interest: 

• DEK oncogene
• Chromatin architecture and function
• Tumorigenesis

Keywords and techniques: Chromatin, EMSA, ChIP-seq, Protein biochemistry  

Biosketch

Ferdinand Kappes earned a “Diplom” (combined BSc and MRes) in molecular biology from the University of Konstanz, Germany, where he also completed his Ph.D. studies and first postdoctoral phase under the guidance of Rolf Knippers. He then joined the laboratory of David Markovitz at the University of Michigan Medical Center in Ann Arbor, U.S., for his second postdoctoral phase. He then returned to Germany to establish his independent laboratory at the RWTH Aachen University at the Institute of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Before joining Duke Kunshan University in 2022, he was an associate professor at Xi’an Jioatong-Liverpool University. XJTLU. 

His research focuses on chromatin biology, epigenetics and tumor biology. He is especially interested in how the unique chromatin-associated DEK oncogene, a long-standing interest in the laboratory, participates in and regulates these processes.  

Publications

• Pierzynska-Mach, A., Czada, C., Vogel, C., Gwosch, E., Osswald, X., Bartoschek, D., Diaspro, A., Kappes, F. and Ferrando-May, E. (2023) DEK oncoprotein participates in heterochromatin replication via SUMO-dependent nuclear bodies. J Cell Sci, 136. 
• Guo, H., Xu, N., Prell, M., Königs, H., Hermanns-Sachweh, B., Lüscher, B. and Kappes, F. (2021) Bacterial Growth Inhibition Screen (BGIS): harnessing recombinant protein toxicity for rapid and unbiased interrogation of protein function. FEBS Lett, 595, 1422-1437. 
• Guo, H., Prell, M., Königs, H., Xu, N., Waldmann, T., Hermans-Sachweh, B., Ferrando-May, E., Lüscher, B. and Kappes, F. (2021) Bacterial Growth Inhibition Screen (BGIS) identifies a loss-of-function mutant of the DEK oncogene, indicating DNA modulating activities of DEK in chromatin. FEBS Lett, 595, 1438-1453. 
• Saha, A.K., Kappes, F., Mundade, A., Deutzmann, A., Rosmarin, D.M., Legendre, M., Chatain, N., Al-Obaidi, Z., Adams, B.S., Ploegh, H.L. et al. (2013) Intercellular trafficking of the nuclear oncoprotein DEK. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 110, 6847-6852. 
• Kappes, F., Waldmann, T., Mathew, V., Yu, J., Zhang, L., Khodadoust, M.S., Chinnaiyan, A.M., Luger, K., Erhardt, S., Schneider, R. et al. (2011) The DEK oncoprotein is a Su(var) that is essential to heterochromatin integrity. Genes Dev, 25, 673-678.

About

Name: Keith M. Kendrick

Current Affiliation: University of Electronic Science and Technology of China

Position: Professor: State Specially Recruited Expert

Research

Research field: Human Social and Cognitive Neuroscience and Autism Spectrum Disorder

Research Interests :

• Establishing brain and eye-tracking based biomarkers for autism
• Developing novel pharmacological and behavioral therapies for autism and other disorders with social dysfunction.

Key words and techniques: Autism, behavioral analysis, brain imaging, clinical Trials, eye-tracking, oxytocin, transcutaneous vagal nerve stimulation, vasopressin

Biosketch

I have been working full-time in the School of Life Science and Technology in UESTC since 2011. He received a PhD in Psychology from Durham University (UK) in 1979 and has held research Positions in Durham University, Institute of Zoology in London, University of Cambridge and the Babraham Institute in Cambridge where he was head of Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience. He is a Fellow of the Society of Biology and an Emeritus Professor of Gresham College in London where he has delivered 30 public lectures on biomedical science since 2002 and also gave a TEDx lecture in 2017. He has published over 280 peer-refereed papers, including many in Nature, Science and PNAS as well as in leading psychiatric journals. His publications have received around 20,000 citations and his H index is 78. He is an “Elsevier China Highly Cited Scholar” for the last 6 years and has received numerous competitive grants from both UK and China-based funding agencies. In 2019 he also received an International Friendship award from the Chinese Government.

His main research work in China is establishing how the human brain interprets social and emotional information and how this becomes impaired in psychiatric disorders, with a primary focus on autism. He is currently carrying out clinical trials for new neurotherapies for autism based on administration or modulation of the neuropeptides oxytocin and vasopressin.

Publications

• Kendrick KM, Guevara-Guzman R, Zorrilla J, Hinton MR, Broad KD, Mimmack M and Ohkura S (1997) Formation of olfactory memories mediated by nitric oxide. Nature 388: 670-674.
• Hurlemann R, Patin A, Oezguer P, Onur OA, Cohen MX, Baumgartner T, Metzler S, Dziobek I, Gallinat J, Wagner M, Maier W & Kendrick KM (2010) Oxytocin enhances amygdala-dependent, socially reinforced learning and emotional empathy in humans. Journal of Neuroscience 30(14):4999 –5007.
• Gao S, Becker B, Luo L, Geng, Y, Zhao W, Yin Y, Hu J, Gao Z, Gong Q, Hurlemann R, Yao D, & Kendrick, K. M. (2016). Oxytocin, the peptide that bonds the sexes also divides them. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 113(27):7650-7654.
• Kou, J., Le, J., Fu, M., Lan, C., Chen, Z., Li, Q., Zhao, W., Xu, L., Becker, B., & Kendrick, K.M. (2019). Comparison of three different eye-tracking tasks for distinguishing autistic from typically developing children and autistic symptom severity. Autism Research, 12(10):1529-1540.
• Kou J, Zhang Y, Zhou F, Sindermann C, Montag C, Becker B…& Kendrick, K.M. (2021). A randomized trial shows dose-frequency and genotype may determine the therapeutic efficacy of intranasal oxytocin. Psychological Medicine https://doi.org/10.1017/S0033291720003803

About

Name: Magdalena Justyna Koziol

Affiliation: Chinese Institute for Brain Research, CIBR

Position: Principal Investigator

Research

Research field: Epigenetics

Research Interest:

• DNA modifications
• RNA modifications
• Epigenetics
• Gene Regulation
• Neurobiology
• Mass Spectrometry
• Bioinformatics

Keywords and techniques: Molecular Biology, RNA biology, detection of DNA and RNA modifications by mass spectrometry, bioinformatic tools for high-throughput sequencing analysis (Illumina, PacBio, Nanopore), human ES cells, mouse models

Biosketch

Magdalena J Koziol did her PhD at the University of Cambridge in John Gurdon’s laboratory, studying how cells are reprogrammed, from highly differentiated into pluripotent cell states. During this time, she got intrigued by how genes are activated and the diversity of RNA molecules. Therefore, as a postdoc, she investigated to function of long-non coding RNAs and early RNA detection in John Rinn’s and Antonio Giraldez’s labs at Harvard and Yale University. She then moved back to Cambridge University, where she independently discovered a novel eukaryotic DNA modification, methylated deoxyadenosine (Koziol et al., 2015). This finding opened and pioneered an exciting new area of biology. Since DNA and RNA modifications seem particularly abundant and functionally important in the brain, Magdalena Koziol’s research focuses now on studying DNA and RNA modifications in the brain.

The goal of the Koziol lab is to make discoveries about the ‘building blocks of life’, namely DNA and RNA, to better understand complex brain functions in healthy and diseased brains. The Koziol lab uses human cell lines and mouse animal models, combines molecular biology, third-generation high-throughput sequencing technologies and state-of-the-art mass spectrometry to study DNA and RNA modifications.

Our research can be divided into the following aims: (1) Improve identification of DNA/RNA modifications; (2) Characterizing proteins and molecular mechanisms that regulate DNA/RNA modifications; (3) Studying brain/neuron function.

Although our lab is based in Beijing, China, we are an international lab, in a world-class internationally oriented research institute, with a collaborative, interactive , supportive and dynamic environment. Our working language is English.

Publications

• Pacini C, Bradshaw CR, Garrett NJ, Koziol MJ*. Characteristics and homogeneity of N6-methylation in human genomes. Scientific Reports, 2019, doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-41601-7
• *Koziol MJ, Bradshaw CR, Allen GE, Costa ASH, Frezza C, Gurdon JB. Identification of methylated deoxyadenosines in vertebrates reveals diversity in DNA modifications. Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, 2015, doi: 10.1038/nsmb.3145
• Cabili MN, Trapnell CB, Goff L, Koziol MJ, Tazon-Vega B, Regev A, Rinn LJ. Integrative annotation of human large non-coding RNAs reveals global properties and specific subclasses. Genes and Development, 2011, doi: 10.1101/gad.17446611
• Huarte M, Guttman M, Feldser D, Garber M, Koziol MJ, Kenzelmann-Broz, Khalil AM, Zuk O, Amit I, Rabani M, Attardi LD, Regev A, Lander ES, Jacks T, Rinn JL. A large intergenic noncoding RNA induced by p53 mediates global gene repression in the p53 response. Cell, 2010, doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2010.06.040
• Guttman M, Garber M, Levin JZ, Donaghey J, Robinson J, Adiconis X, Fan L, Koziol MJ, Gnirke A, Nusbaum C, Rinn JL, Lander ES, Regev A. Ab initio reconstruction of cell type-specific transcriptomes in mouse reveals the conserved multi-exonic structure of lincRNAs. Nature Biotechnology, 2010, doi: 10.1038/nbt.1633

About

Name: Pedro Laborda

Current Affiliation: School of Life Sciences, Nantong University, Nantong 226019, People’s Republic of China

Position: Professor (full) / Group Leader

Research

Research field: Biocontrol of Plant Diseases

Research interests:

• Development of new strategies for the management of plant and postharvest diseases.
• Discovery of new bacterial and fungal plant diseases in China.
• Study of the antifungal and antibacterial mode of action of natural compounds.
• Overproduction of antimicrobial metabolites using bio-engineered bacterial strains.

Keywords and techniques: Postharvest Biology; Biological Control; Agricultural Chemistry; Fungal Plant Diseases; Food Science.

Biosketch

Pedro Laborda is Full Professor and Group Leader in the School of Life Sciences in Nantong University. He holds a PhD degree in Organic Chemistry in the University of Zaragoza (Spain). He was postdoctoral researcher in Nanjing Agricultural University and Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Sciences from January 2015 to December 2018. In 2019, he was appointed as full professor in Nantong University where he established the Agricultural Microbiology research group. His team has currently 8 associate professors, is publishing more than 10 SCI articles per year and is supported by the Natural National Science Foundation of China. He has cooperation agreements with 3 different companies, and participates in the programs of Alleviation of Poverty from the Chinese Government in Hanzhong municipality (Shaanxi Province).

Publications

• Wang S, Shi X, Zhu G, Zhang Y, Jin D, Zhou Y, Liu F, Laborda P (2021) Application of surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy using silver and gold nanoparticles for the detection of pesticides in fruit and fruit juice. Trends in Food Science and Technology 116: 583-602.
• Zhu G, Sha P, Zhu X, Shi X, Shahriar M, Zhou Y, Wang S, Laborda P (2021) Application of melatonin for the control of food-borne Bacillus species in cherry tomatoes. Postharvest Biology and Technology 181: 111656.
• Chen Y, Zhou Y, Laborda P, Wang H, Wang R, Chen X, Liu F, Yang D, Wang S, Shi X, Laborda P (2021) Mode of action and efficacy of quinolinic acid for the control of Ceratocystis fimbriata on sweet potato. Pest Management Science 77: 4564-4571.
• Laborda P, Li C, Zhao Y, Tang B, Ling J, He F, Liu F (2019) Antifungal metabolite p-aminobenzoic acid (pABA): Mechanism of action and efficacy for the biocontrol of pear bitter rot disease. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry 67: 2157-2165.
• Wang S, Shi X, Liu F, Laborda P (2021) Effects of exogenous methyl jasmonate on quality and preservation of postharvest fruits: A review. Food Chemistry 353: 129482.

About

Name: Dimitri Lavillette

Current Affiliation: Institut Pasteur Shanghai, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China

Position: Professor, Principal investigator

Research

Research field: Virology

Research interest:

• Difference in tissue tropism and interspecies transmission of arboviruses,
• Q1. Which common or specific factors are involved in arbovirus cell entry?
• Q2. How arboviruses modulate and exploit host cell response depending on the different species?
• Preparedness : anticipate needs for next zoonotic virus outbreaks
• Q3. What are the risk for urban emergence of underestimated arboviruses?
• Understand the specific properties of SARS-CoV-2 entry mechanism and inhibit it
• Use entry studies of SARS-CoV-2 to understand the mode of action of entry inhibitors
• Develop vaccine strategies and universal vaccine
• Develop neutralizing nanobodies and neutralizing human monoclonal antibodies

Keywords and techniques: Viruses, entry, vaccine, neutralizing antibodies, therapeutics, diagnosis, zoonosis, transboundary, preparedness, CRISPR/Cas9 Whole genome screen, stable Knock-in / Knock-out cell lines (cell biology), molecular virology, in vivo infection models, transduction, nanobodies, monoclonal human antibodies

Biosketch

Dimitri LAVILLETTE received his PhD in 2000 in Lyon (France) and achieved a 3 year post doc in the laboratory of David Kabat (“HIV-1, retroviruses and receptors”; Portland, Oregon, U.S.A.). He then secured a tenure staff scientist Position at the National Center of Scientific Research in France (CNRS) (2003-2014) in the laboratory of François-Loic COSSET (Retroviral vectorology and gene therapy, Lyon, France) to work on Hepatitis C virus. Dimitri LAVILLETTE received his habilitation to supervise research (Ecole Normale Superieur de Lyon) in 2009. After one year as a visiting scientist in Oxford University (Antivirals group from Pr Nicole ZITZMANN, Glycobiology institute, Oxford, UK), he joined the “Microbial Dynamics and Viral Transmission” team (Patrick MAVINGUI, Ecology department, Lyon, FR) in 2012 to work on arbovirus. In 2015, he took a professor Position at the Pasteur Institute Shanghai – Chinese academy of Sciences (IPS-CAS, China) to lead the “Interspecies transmission of arboviruses and antivirals” unit. Having worked on major virus threats (Human immunodeficiency virus, Hepatitis C virus), he decided to develop works on emerging and re-emerging viruses with a focus on viruses transmitted by mosquitoes like Dengue, Zika and Chikungunya viruses. More recently, using his expertise in the context of COVID-19 pandemic, he created therapeutic strategies against SARS-CoV-2 virus by developing vaccine and neutralizing antibodies. Overall, by studying both infections in mammals and insects in vitro and/or in vivo, his global project aims to : i) explore the role of key viral and host determinants in animal to human spillover and virus induced pathology (for SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, Chikungunya alphavirus, Dengue and Zika flavivirus, ii) characterize neglected viruses in the context of a preparedness program to anticipate needs for next outbreaks in term of diagnostic and first line treatments. Dimitri LAVILLETTE recognition can be inferred from his 69 publications, his participation to more than 90 communications at international meetings, 10 patents, his tenure French national Position at CNRS, his election at the “European society for virology” as treasurer (2013-2016) and organizer of its meeting in 2013, and his consulting activities for biotechnology companies. In China, Dimitri LAVILLETTE was the laureate of the 100 talent and PIFI program from CAS, NSFC general grant, 1000 Talent of Shanghai Municipality and the 2020 Magnolia sliver Award from Shanghai Municipal Foreign Affairs Office.

Publications

• A synthetic nanobody targeting RBD protects hamsters from SARS-CoV-2 infection. Li T, Cai H, Yao H, Zhou B, Zhang N, van Vlissingen MF, Kuiken T, Han W, GeurtsvanKessel CH, Gong Y, Zhao Y, Shen Q, Qin W, Tian XX, Peng C, Lai Y, Wang Y, Hutter CAJ, Kuo SM, Bao J, Liu C, Wang Y, Richard AS, Raoul H, Lan J, Seeger MA, Cong Y, Rockx B, Wong G*, Bi Y*, Lavillette D*, Li D*. Nat Commun. 2021 Jul 30;12(1):4635. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-24905-z.
• Zika virus pathogenesis and current therapeutic advances. Mwaliko C, Nyaruaba R, Zhao L, Atoni E, Karungu S, Mwau M, Lavillette D, Xia H, Yuan Z. Pathog Glob Health. 2020 Nov 14:1-19. doi: 10.1080/20477724.2020.1845005. Review
• Immunization with the receptor-binding domain of SARS-CoV-2 elicits antibodies cross-neutralizing SARS-CoV-2 and SARS-CoV without antibody-dependent enhancement. Zang J, Gu C, Zhou B, Zhang C, Yang Y, Xu S, Bai L, Zhang R, Deng Q, Yuan Z, Tang H, Qu D, Lavillette D*, Xie Y*, Huang Z*. Cell Discov. 2020 Sep 3;6:61. doi: 10.1038/s41421-020-00199-1. eCollection 2020.PMID: 32901211
• A protein coevolution method uncovers critical features of the Hepatitis C Virus fusion mechanism. Douam F, Fusil F, Enguehard M, Dib L, Nadalin F, Schwaller L, Hrebikova G, Mancip J, Mailly L, Montserret R, Ding Q, Maisse C, Carlot E, Xu K, Verhoeyen E, Baumert T, Ploss A, Carbone A, Cosset FL and Lavillette D*. PLoS Pathog. 2018 Mar 5;14(3):e1006908. doi: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1006908.
• Co-infection of mosquitoes with chikungunya and dengue viruses reveals modulation of the replication of both viruses in midguts and salivary glands of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes.. Le Coupanec A, Tchankouo-Nguetcheu S, Roux P, Khun H, Huerre M, Morales-Vargas R, Enguehard M, Lavillette D, Missé D, Choumet V. Int J Mol Sci. 2017 Aug 4;18(8). pii: E1708. doi: 10.3390/ijms18081708. PMID: 28777313

About

Name: LO-MAN Richard 

Current Affiliation: CAS – SHANGHAI INSTITUTE OF IMMUNITY AND INFECTION  

(FORMLERLY INSTITUT PASTEUR SHANGHAI) 

Position: PROFESSOR – PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR  

Research

Research field:  Immunology 

Research interest: 

• Immune system
• Microbiota interactions

Keywords and techniques: Antibodies – Gut – Newborn – Vaccine – Cancer, scRNAseq and High content flow cytometry  

Biosketch

25 years of experience in Academic and Biomedical Research at Institut Pasteur. Expert in OMIC technologies applied to Biomedical research – Experience in institutional, academic and industrial partnerships in France, in EU and in China – Technological transfer and translational research programs as a contractor and in partnership with Big pharma – Development of intellectual properties and patent filling as inventor – Leader and coordinator of research programs – Experiences in clinical research with hospitals 

 

Publications

• X. Zhang, D. Zhivaki, R. Lo-Man, Unique aspects of the perinatal immune system.  Nat Rev Immunol, 2017;17, 495-507.  Focus on newborn specific regulatory development and functions in health and diseases 
• Zhivaki D, Lemoine S, …Lo-Man R. Respiratory Syncytial Virus Infects Regulatory B Cells in Human Neonates via Chemokine Receptor CX3CR1 and Promotes Lung Disease Severity. Immunity, 2017;46(2):301-314.  1st evidence of fetal Breg development and characterization of a biomarker of RSV induced bronchiolitis in newborns.  
• Zhang, X., Mozeleski, …and Lo-Man, R., CD4 T cells with effector memory phenotype and function develop in the sterile environment of the fetus. Sci Transl Med, 2014; 6(238): p. 238ra72. 1st evidence of fetal development of memory T cell in humans. 
• Zhang, X., Majlessi, L…and Lo-Man, R., Coactivation of Syk kinase and MyD88 adaptor protein pathways by bacteria promotes regulatory properties of neutrophils. Immunity, 2009; 31(5):761-771. 1st evidence of regulatory of neutrophils. Demonstration provided in the context of TB infection.

About

Name: Lu Xiao

Current Affiliation: Shanghai Bio-lu Biomaterials Co., Ltd.

Position: Director of R&D

Research

Research field: Material science

Research interests: 

• bioceramics

Keywords and techniques : medical devices, synthetic bone graft substitutes, bioceramics, porous biomaterials, β-tricalcium phosphate, hydroxyapatite, tissue engineering

Biosketch

Initially trained as a chemistry engineer, majoring in med chem and organic synthesis. I have specialized myself with a PhD degree in biomaterials. I have a vast professional experience in the medical devices industry, especially in orthopedics solutions and bone graft substitutes.

My team and I mainly focus on R&D of innovative biomaterials for orthopaedic application and tissue engineering, such as porous β-tricalcium phosphate bioceramics, silicate-substituted calcium phosphate biphasic bioceramics, self-setting calcium phosphate cements and collagen/bioceramic hybrid material.

One of our key research is the use of interconnected porous structure to achieve guided growth of new tissue, especially for angioconduction and osteoconduction.

Working in the private sector, our research application oriented, and we have successfully industrialized two of our research results, obtaining their registration as class III medical device. Notably, we developed an angioconductive bioceramic rod for the minimally-invasive treatment of the avascular necrosis of the femoral head.

Publications

• Lu, Y., Wang, Z., Lu, X., et al. (2019). [Minimally invasive treatment for osteonecrosis of the femoral head in ARCO stage Ⅱ and Ⅲ with bioceramic system]. Chinese journal of reparative and reconstructive surgery, 33 10, 1291-1298 .
• Lu, Y., Li, M., Long, Z., et al. (2019). Collagen/β-TCP composite as a bone-graft substitute for posterior spinal fusion in rabbit model: a comparison study. Biomedical materials, 14 4, 045009 .
• Lu, Y., Lu, X., Li, M., et al. (2018). Minimally invasive treatment for osteonecrosis of the femoral head with angioconductive bioceramic rod. International Orthopaedics, 42, 1567-1573.
• Lu, X., Wang, Y., & Jin, F. (2016). Influence of a non-biodegradable porous structure on bone repair. RSC Advances, 6, 80522-80528.

About

Name: Tomasz Maj

Current Affiliation: Institution: Institute of Molecular Medicine, Renji Hospital affiliated to Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China

Position: Researcher

Research

Research field: Immunology / tumor immunology/ autoimmunity

Research Interests :

• T cells and antigen presenting cells functionality in the tumor microenvironment
• Interactions between microbiota and immune cells in fibrotic process
• Regulation of antigen-specific response in autoimmune disorders
• Impact of cellular and tissue metabolic environment on leukocytes biology

Keywords and techniques: immunity, tumor immunology, immunometabolism, autoimmunity, fibrosis, immunosuppression, T cells, macrophages, dendritic cells, classical lab methods (cell culture, immunoblotting, qPCR, ELISA, flow cytometry, etc.); cell culture, differentiation, and stimulation of human and mouse T cells, DCs, and macrophages; mouse tumor models (including patient-derived xenografts); methods related to cellular metabolism (Seahorse, functional assays, etc.); scRNA-Seq; bioinformatics and biostatistics (R, Python, basic Perl).

Biosketch

I am a biologist with a master’s degree in microbiology from the University of Wroclaw, Poland. I received Ph.D. training from the Hirszfeld Institute of Immunology and Experimental Therapy, Polish Academy of Sciences. During this time, I worked in the field of reproductive immunology, especially on the preimplantation period of pregnancy and the effects of estrogens on the immune system. Since 2012 I was working in Weiping Zou Lab at the University of Michigan, initially as a post-doc, later in the Position of senior research specialist. My primary research focus was epigenetic and metabolic regulation of anti-tumor immunity and immunotherapy. Since November 2019, I am the leader of a research group in the Institute of Molecular Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine.

Publications

• Maj T, Wang W, Crespo J, Zhang H, Wang W, Wei S, Zhao L, Vatan L, Shao I, Szeliga W, Lyssiotis C, Liu JR, Kryczek I, Zou W. Oxidative stress controls regulatory T cell apoptosis and suppressor activity and PD-L1-blockade resistance in tumor. Nat Immunol 2017; 18:1332
• Zhao E*, Maj T*, Kryczek I, Li W, Wu K, Zhao L, Wei S, Crespo J, Wan S, Vatan L, Szeliga W, Shao I, Wang Y, Liu Y, Varambally S, Chinnaiyan AM, Welling TH, Marquez V, Kotarski J, Wang H, Wang Z, Zhang Y, Liu R, Wang G, Zou W. Cancer mediates effector T cell dysfunction by targeting microRNAs and EZH2 via glycolysis restriction. Nat Immunol 2016; 17:95 (Co-first author)

About

Name: Mario Andrea Marchisio

Current Affiliation: School of Pharmaceutical Science and Technology, Tianjin University

Position Associate Professor

Research

Research field:  Synthetic Biology

Research interests:

• Computational circuit design—Automation and modeling.
• CRISPR-dCas-based circuits in yeast S. cerevisiae cells.
• Biosensing systems.
• Characterization of DNA/RNA circuit components in S. cerevisiae.

Keywords and techniques: Modeling, CRISPR-Cas, anti-CRISPR proteins, biosensors, circuit design

Biosketch

I have got a PhD in computational nuclear physics in 2002 at the University of Trento (Italy) after a master’s degree in physics as well (at the University of Eastern Piedmont—Alessandria, Italy). For four years, I worked at the CILEA computing center in Milan, before starting doing research in synthetic biology. In this, that is my current discipline, I had a long Post Doc (six years) at the ETH Zurich making experience both in the computational and wet-lab side of this multidisciplinary science. Before joining Tianjin University in 2018, I have been associate professor (in synthetic biology) at the Harbin Institute of Technology—School of Life Science.

Publications

• Yu, L., & Marchisio, M. A. (2021). Saccharomyces cerevisiae Synthetic Transcriptional Networks Harnessing dCas12a and Type V-A anti-CRISPR Proteins. ACS Synthetic Biology. http://doi.org/10.1021/acssynbio.1c00006
• Feng, X., & Marchisio, M. A. (2021). Novel S. cerevisiae Hybrid Synthetic Promoters Based on Foreign Core Promoter Sequences. International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 22(11), 5704. http://doi.org/10.3390/ijms22115704
• Li, J., Xu, Z., Chupalov, A., & Marchisio, M. A. (2018). Anti-CRISPR-based biosensors in the yeast S. cerevisiae. Journal of Biological Engineering, 12(1), 11. http://doi.org/10.1186/s13036-018-0101-z
• Marchisio, M. A., & Stelling, J. (2011). Automatic design of digital synthetic gene circuits. PLoS Computational Biology, 7(2), e1001083. http://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1001083
• Marchisio, M. A., & Stelling, J. (2008). Computational design of synthetic gene circuits with composable parts. Bioinformatics, 24(17), 1903–1910. http://doi.org/10.1093/bioinformatics/btn330

About

Name: Dr Quentin Montardy

Current Affiliation: Brain Cognition and Brain Disease Institute (Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences).

Director of a thematic team within the CNRS GDR Vertige (CNRS GDR#2074, France).

Position: Assistant Professor

Research

Research field: Neuroscience of emotion and behaviors, Neural circuitry of emotion

Research interest:

• Mapping circuit reciprocally connecting subcortical sensorimotor nuclei to emotion circuits
• Investigating the functions of these circuits, under the scope of innate behaviors (fear, anxiety, aversion and reward)
• Understanding how prior emotional states modulate sensory integration, and regulate subsequent emotional behaviors.

Keywords and techniques: Brain circuitry, survival behaviors, fear & anxiety, vision, balance, vertigo, viral tracing, neuronal manipulation, optogenetic & chemogenetics (In-vivo free-moving), calcium imaging (In-vivo free-moving), animal and human behavior

Biosketch

Dr. Quentin Montardy is Assistant Professor at the Brain Cognition and Brain Disease Institute (Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences). He is also director of a thematic team within the CNRS GDR Vertige (CNRS GDR#2074, France).

Dr. Montardy research focuses on the subcortical networks linking perceptions and emotional behaviors. He is interested in understanding how sensory stimulation provoke emotions, such as fear and anxiety behaviors, and how emotions can modulate perceptions. His recent work has led him to further investigate the consequences of vestibular sensations (e.g. balance) on emotional behavior from an ecological and psychiatric point of view, both

Publications

• Q. Montardy, M. Wei, T. Yi, X. Liu, Z. Zhou, S. Besnard, B. Tighilet, C. Chabbert, L. Wang (Prog. Neurobiol., 2021) Novel Model of Reversible Vestibular Syndrom Induced by Optogenetic Stimulation
• Q. Montardy, W. Kwan, L. Wang, J. Bourne, C.T. Gross (Brain Struct. Funct., 2020) Mapping the neural circuitry of predator fear in the nonhuman primate.
• Q. Montardy, Z. Zhou, Z. Lei, X. Liu, P. Zeng, C. Chen, Y. Liu, P. Sanz-Leon, K. Huang, L. Wang (Neurosc. Let., 2020) Glutamatergic and GABAergic neuronal populations in the dorsolateral Periacqueductual Gray have different functional roles in fear conditioning.
• Q. Montardy, Z. Zhou, Z. Lei, X. Liu, P. Zeng, C. Chen, Y. Liu, P. Sanz-Leon, K. Huang, L. Wang (Sci. Bull., 2019) Characterization of glutamatergic VTA neural population responses to aversive and rewarding conditioning in freely-moving mice.
• Z. Zhou, X Liu, S Chen, Z Zhang, Y Liu, Q. Montardy, Y Tang, P Wei, N Liu, L Li, X He, G Bi, C T Gross, G Feng, F Xu & L Wang (Neuron, 2019) A VTA GABAergic neural circuit mediates visually evoked innate fear responses

About

Name: Jose C. Pastor Pareja

Current Affiliation: Tsinghua University, Tsinghua-Peking Center for Life Sciences

Position: Professor

Research

Research field: Developmental and cellular biology

Research interests:

• morphogenesis
• extracellular matrix
• secretion
• cytoskeleton

Keywords and techniques: collagen, basement membranes, COPII vesicles, Drosophila genetics and transgenesis, 3D-SIM superresolution microscopy, FIB-SEM electron microscopy.

Biosketch

I did my Ph.D. in Madrid (CBM, CSIC-UAM), studying invasive cell behavior during metamorphosis of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. As a postdoc at Yale School of Medicine, I investigated oncogenic cooperation and metastasis using Drosophila tumor models. The focus of my current research is the extracellular matrix. My laboratory at Tsinghua University uses genetic, molecular, cellular and imaging approaches in Drosophila to investigate the secretion of collagen, the normal assembly and fibrotic misassembly of basement membranes and related matrices, and their roles in morphogenesis, cell signaling, regeneration, immune responses and tumor progression.

Publications

• Yang K, Liu M, Feng Z, Rojas-Amado M, Zhou LJ, Ke HM, Pastor-Pareja JC* (2021). ER exit sites in Drosophila display abundant ER-Golgi vesicles and pearled tubes but no megacarriers. Cell Reports (in press).
• Sun T, Song Y, Teng D, Chen Y, Dai J, Ma M, Zhang W, Pastor-Pareja JC* (2021). Atypical laminin spots and pull-generated microtubule-actin projections mediate Drosophila wing adhesion. Cell Reports (in press).
• Pastor-Pareja JC (2020). Atypical basement membranes and basement membrane diversity – what is normal anyway? J Cell Sci 133: jcs241794 (review).
• Sun T, Song Y, Dai J, Mao D, Ma M, Ni JQ, Liang X, Pastor-Pareja JC* (2019). Spectraplakin Shot maintains perinuclear microtubule organization in Drosophila polyploid cells. Dev Cell 49:731.
• Ma M, Cao X, Dai J, Pastor-Pareja JC* (2017). Basement membrane manipulation in Drosophila wing discs affects Dpp retention but not growth mechanoregulation. Dev Cell 42: 97.

About

Name: David Pitarch Ibanez

Current Affiliation: Guangzhou Institutes of Biomedicine and Health

Position: PhD student

Research

Research field: Stem cell biology

Research interest:

• disease modelling
• regenerative medicine

Keywords and techniques: Biology, disease modelling, stem cells, pluripotency, CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing, molecular biology, cell culturing (mostly human stem cells).

Biosketch

I received a bachelor’s degree in biology science by the University of Valencia (Spain) in 2012. From 2013 to 2016 I did a master’s degree in the Guangzhou Institutes of Biomedicine and Health, an institution belonging to the University of Chinese Academy of Science. The topic of my work was modelling Parkinson`s disease (PD) usingneurons derived from human induced pluripotent stem cells genetically modified to inactivated PD related genes. Currently I am finishing my PhD studies at the same institution, working on characterize the transition between different pluripotent states in human stem cells at transcriptional and epigenetic level.

Publications

• Zhuang Q, Li W, Benda C, Huang Z, Ahmed T, Liu P, Guo X, Ibañez DP, Luo Z, Zhang M, Md Abdul M, Yang Z, Yang J, Huang Y, Zhang H, Huang D, Zhou J, Zhong X, Zhu X, Fu X, Fan W, Liu Y, Xu Y, Ward C, Khan MJ, Kanwal S, Mirza B, Tortorella MD, Tse HF, Chen J, Qin B, Bao X, Gao S, Hutchins AP, Esteban MA. NCoR/SMRT co-repressors cooperate with c-MYC to create an epigenetic barrier to somatic cell reprogramming. Nature Cell Biology, 2018. 20(4):400-412.
• Zhang M, Ibanez DP, Fan W, Liu H, Zhong X, Wang X, Li Y, Md Abdul M, Li W, Li Y, Ward C, Chen S, Wang D, Qin B, Esteban MA, Zhao P, Luo Z. Generation of a PARK2 homozygous knockout induced pluripotent stem cell line (GIBHi002-A-1) with two common isoforms abolished. Stem Cell Research, 2019. 41:101602.
• Tariq M, Liu H, Ibanez DP, Li Y, Chen S, Jiang M, Fan W, Zhao P, Luo Z, Wang D, Kanwal S. Generation of three induced pluripotent stem cell lines from a Parkinson’s disease patient with mutant PARKIN (p. C253Y). Stem Cell Research, 2020. 45:101822.
• Zhang M, Lai Yiwei L, Krupalnik V, Guo P,Guo X, Zhou J, Xu Y, Yu Z,Liu L, Jiang A, Li W, Abdul MM, Ma G, Li N, Fu X, Lv Y, Jiang M, Tariq M, Kanwal S, Liu H, Xu X, Zhang H, Huang Y, Wang L, Chen S, Babarinde IA, Luo Z, Wang D, Zhou T, Ward C, He M, Ibañez DP, Li Y, Zhou J, Yuan J, Feng Y, Arumugam K, Di Vicino U, Bao X, Wu G, Schambach A, Wang H, Sun H, Gao F, Qin B, Hutchins AP, Doble BW, Hartmann C, Cosma MP, Qin Y, Xu GL, Chen R, Volpe G, Chen L, Hanna JH, Esteban MA. β-catenin safeguards the ground state of pluripotency by strengthening the robustness of the transcriptional apparatus. Science Advances, 2020. 6(29):eaba1593.

About

Name: Sara Platto

Current Affiliation: Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Sciences, Jianghan University (Wuhan)

Position: Associate Professor

Research

Research field: Animal behavior and welfare

Research interest:

• Animal behavior
• Animal welfare
• Animal conservation
• Educational programs on rabies prevention to the public in China
• Collaboration with environmental Chinese NGO on animal conservation

Keywords and techniques: questionnaires for assessing Chinese animal industry stakeholders’ attitude towards animal welfare; questionnaire to assess relationship between pet owners during the different lockdowns in China

Biosketch

Dr. Sara Platto is an Italian research and practitioner across the domain of veterinary, animal behavior and welfare sciences, with expertise gathered from a twenty years work with different aspects of the animal-human-environment interface. For the last fourteen years, Dr. Platto has been a practicing animal behavior and welfare expert in China. She got her degree in Veterinary Medicine from the University of the Studies of Milan in 1999, and her PhD in Psychobiology (biology of animal behavior) in a joint collaboration between the University of Milan (Italy) and the Dolphin Reef International Lab (Israel) in 2006. In 2010, Dr Platto started her Postdoctoral research with the Institute of Hydrobiology, Chinese Academy of Science (Wuhan) where she studied the welfare of captive cetaceans by using passive acoustic monitoring (PAM), and lateral behaviors in Yangtze finless porpoises. Currently, she is Associate Professor for Animal Behavior and Welfare at the college of Life Sciences (Jianghan University, Wuhan). Since 2018, Dr. Platto is UFAW (University Federation Animal Welfare)-Link at Jianghan University, which involve organizing seminars, on site and online, on different aspects of animal welfare for Chinese students. During these years, Dr. Platto has opened the courses on animal behavior and welfare and carried out studies to assess the attitudes of Chinese animal industry stakeholders’ attitude towards animal welfare. A big part of Dr. Platto work in China has been outside the academia. As a veterinarian, Dr Platto has always been interested in zoonosis (diseases transmitted from animals to humans), particularly rabies. For this reason, she has delivered lectures on rabies management to students of veterinary school every years since 2014. In 2017, Dr Platto started the Wuhan Rabies Prevention Campaign which has been held every years since it first started, and involving local veterinarians, communities, researchers from universities, CDC professionals, human doctors, and pharmaceutical companies to carry out public education for rabies prevention. In 2019, Dr Platto was also invited by the Chongqing CDC to deliver a lecture for CDC veterinarians on the tools for rabies prevention and surveillance developed by GARC. Since 2010, Dr Platto has also delivered workshops and lectures to elementary, kindergarten schools, parents and teachers on animal behavior and rabies prevention in Beijing and Wuhan. The material, that was used during the aforementioned educational programs, was collected in a book “Matteo in Doggy’s World: how dogs show their mood”, published in 2017 (bilingual: English and Chinese. Platto S, 2017. Available on Amazon: ISBN-13: 978-1543158601). Thanks to her past work experience in wildlife rescue centre in Spain and USA, Dr. Platto also consulted for CBCGDF (China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation) on different aspects of animal protection such as writing articles for the public on the management of pets during the epidemic; participating to the draft of suggestions for the new Chinese National Legislation for Wildlife Protection; consulting on different issues related to the rescue of wildlife in China; and delivering speeches at different international webinars and conferences on the subject of animal welfare and conservation.

Publications

• Platto S., Wang D., Wang K. (2016). Variation of the sounds rate in a captive group of false killer whales (Pseudorca crassidens) during feedings: possible food anticipatory vocal activity. Chinese J. Ocean. And Limnol. 34 (6): 1218.-1237 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00343-016- 5074-5
• Platto S., Zhang C., Pine M.K., Irwing A., Wang D (2017). Laterality in Yangtze finless porpoises (Neophocaena phocaenoides asiaeorientalis). Behavioural Processes Journal. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.beproc.2017.04.015
• Platto S, Guo A, Zhu Q., Qighai H., Guo A., Shisun H, Varos A, Irwin A. (2020). Chinese Farmers ’ Attitude Towards the Improvement of Animal Welfare in Their Facilities. Animal Welfare Journal 29: 99-112
• Platto S, Wang Y, Wang H, Zhou J, Carafoli E. (2020). Biodiversity loss and pandemics. Journal of Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications 538 (2021) 2e13 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbrc.2020.10.028
• Platto S, Wang Y, Wang H, Zhou J (2021). First Confirmed Sighting of Steller Sea Lion (Eumetopias jubatus) in China since 1990. Aquatic Mammal Journal 47(2): 216-226. DOI 10.1578/AM.47.2.2021.216

About

Name: Poetsch Ansgar

Current Affiliation: School of Biomedical Sciences, University of Hong Kong

Position:  Associate Professor

Research

Research field:  Biological Mass Spectrometry

Research interest: 

• Function of membrane proteins,
• Membrane protease substrates and regulation
• Analysis of protein modifications

Keyords and techniques: Proteomics, protein purification, microbiology

Biosketch

1995 Chemical Engineering, Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany

1999 PhD in Biophysical Chemistry, Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany

2005 MSc in Bioinformatics, University of Manchester, UK

2002-2016 Group leader in department of Plant Biochemistry, Ruhr University Bochum

2017-2019 Associate Professor for Proteomics, Faculty of Medicine, Plymouth University, UK

Since 2022 Professor, Faculty of Medicine, Nanchang University

Publications

• Fischer, F., D. Wolters, M. Rogner and A. Poetsch (2006). “Toward the complete membrane proteome – High coverage of integral membrane proteins through transmembrane peptide detection.” Molecular & Cellular Proteomics 5(3): 444-453.
• Trotschel, C., S. P. Albaum, D. Wolff, S. Schroder, A. Goesmann, T. W. Nattkemper and A. Poetsch (2012). “Protein turnover quantification in a multilabeling approach: from data calculation to evaluation.” Mol Cell Proteomics 11(8): 512-526.
• Ramallo Guevara, C., O. Philipp, A. Hamann, A. Werner, H. D. Osiewacz, S. Rexroth, M. Rogner and A. Poetsch (2016). “Global Protein Oxidation Profiling Suggests Efficient Mitochondrial Proteome Homeostasis During Aging.” Mol Cell Proteomics 15(5): 1692-1709.
• Trotschel, C., H. Hamzeh, L. Alvarez, R. Pascal, F. Lavryk, W. Bonigk, H. G. Korschen, A. Muller, A. Poetsch, A. Rennhack, L. Gui, D. Nicastro, T. Strunker, R. Seifert and U. B. Kaupp (2020). “Absolute proteomic quantification reveals design principles of sperm flagellar chemosensation.” Embo J 39(4): e102723.
• You, W., L. Wei, Y. Gong, M. E. Hajjami, J. Xu and A. Poetsch (2020). “Integration of proteome and transcriptome refines key molecular processes underlying oil production in Nannochloropsis oceanica.” Biotechnol Biofuels 13: 109.

About

Name: Antoine Riaud

Current Affiliation: Fudan University, Institute of Microelectronic

Position: Associate Professor

Research

Research field: Microfluidic technologies

Research interests: 

• acoustic cell and particle sorting (acoustophoresis)
• acoustic cell and particle trapping (acoustic tweezers)
• positioning of droplets using electric fields (electrowetting)
• microscale sensors

Keywords and techniques: microfluidics, microfabrication, MEMS, surface acoustic waves, simulations

Biosketch

Antoine Riaud is a member of the MicroElectroMechanical Systems (MEMS) lab headed by professor Zhou. After a double master degree between Centrale Lille (a French Grande Ecole) and Tsinghua University (Beijing), he did a PhD at Pierre and Marie Curie University (Paris) and Lille University. Graduating in 2016, his PhD thesis on microscale acoustic tweezers was ranked by the French Mechanical Society among the top 5 over the 20116-2017 period. Riaud has then worked as postdoctoral researcher in the laboratory of precision medicine (Paris 5 University) to develop microfluidic techniques against cancer, and joined Fudan University in 2018 as associate professor.

Riaud’s team develops microfluidic technologies for biological and chemical applications. Three prominent directions are simulation tools for microfluidics (multiphase flow, electrocapillary phenomena etc), acoustofluidics, which enables the contactless manipulation of cells and fluid pumping in microfluidic devices using low-power ultrasonic waves, and electrowetting, which is a toolbox for the manipulation of microliter droplets (displacement, splitting, merging, mixing…).

Publications

• Baudoin, Michaël, et al. “Folding a focalized acoustical vortex on a flat holographic transducer: miniaturized selective acoustical tweezers.” Science advances 5.4 (2019): eaav1967.
• Riaud, Antoine, et al. “Mechanical characterization of cells and microspheres sorted by acoustophoresis with in-line resistive pulse sensing.” Physical Review Applied 13.3 (2020): 034058.
• Wang, Qing, et al. “Acoustic Radiation Force on Small Spheres Due to Transient Acoustic Fields.” Physical Review Applied 15.4 (2021): 044034.
• Riaud, A., et al. “On the influence of viscosity and caustics on acoustic streaming in sessile droplets: an experimental and a numerical study with a cost-effective method.” Journal of Fluid Mechanics 821 (2017): 384-420.
• Riaud, Antoine, et al. “Numerical study of surfactant dynamics during emulsification in a T-junction microchannel.” Langmuir 34.17 (2018): 4980-4990.

About

Name: Marta Rojas Amado

Current affiliation: School of Medicine, Tsinghua University

Position: Associate Research Scientist

Research

Research field: Cellular Biology

Research interests:

•  ​​​​​nonconding RNAs
• secretion
• basement membranes
• tumour growth and invasion

Keywords and techniques: lncRNA, RNA granules, 3D-SIM super resolution microscopy, FIB-SEM electron microscopy, drosophila genetics.

Biosketch

Marta Rojas earned a BS in Biology at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She conducted her PhD project under the supervision of Prof Benjamin Piña and Prof Jose Portugal at the Molecular Biology Institute of Barcelona, CSIC. She studied the DNA-intercalating drugs effects in the budding transcriptome and graduated in 2007 in Biomedicine from the University of Barcelona. In January 2008, as a postdoctoral associated she joined Prof. Sandra Wolin laboratory at the School of Medicine at Yale University. She conducted her research in RNA binding proteins and RNA granules in yeast as well in mouse stem cells. From 2013 to 2018 performed her second postdoctoral stay at the laboratory of Prof. Xiaohua Shen at the School of Medicine, Tsinghua University in Beijing. She investigated the functionality of lncRNAs in mouse stem cells and in Drosophila. After completing her postdoctoral stay, she accepted an associate research scientist position until now.

Publications

• Yang, k., Liu, M., Feng, Z., Rojas, M., Zhou, L., Ke, H., Pastor-Pareja, JC. 2021. ER exit sites in Drosophila display abundant ER-Golgi vesicles and pearled tubes but no megacarriers. Cell Rep 14;36(11):109707.
• Rojas, M., Farr G.W., Fernandez, C.F., Lauden, L., McCormack, J.C. and Wollin, S.L. 2012. Yeast Gis2 and its Human Ortholog CNBP are Novel Components of Stress-Induced RNP Granules. PLoS ONE 7(12):e52824.
• Rojas, M., Casado, M., Portugal, J., and Piña, B. 2008. Selective inhibition of yeast regulons by daunorubicin: a transcriptome-wide analysis. BMC Genomics 9:358.
• Rojas, M., Wright, C.W, Piña, B. and Portugal, J. 2008. Genomewide expression profiling of cryptolepine-induced toxicity in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Antimicrob Agents Chemother 52:3844-50.

About

Name: Philippe Sansonetti

Current Affiliation: Center for Microbes, Development and Health (CMDH) – Institut Pasteur of Shanghai (IPS) – Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS)

Position: Chief Scientist and Principal Investigator of the Molecular Microbial Pathogenesis and Symbiosis Unit

Research

Research field: Molecular and cellular mechanisms of bacterial symbiosis, microbiology, infectious diseases, molecular and cellular pathogenesis of bacterial infections

Research interests:

• Deciphering the logics of ecological successions that support the assembly of a fully mature gut microbiota from birth to 2-3 years of life
• Identifying and experimentally validating the major mechanisms supporting the colonization barrier effect of the gut microbiota.

Keywords and techniques: Bacteriology, immunology of infections, bacterial pathogenesis, microbiota, symbiosis, microbial metabolism, organoid, germ-free mice, analytical chemistry

Biosketch

-Professor, Chair of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, Collège de France, Paris

Emeritus Professor, Institut Pasteur Paris

-Professor, Head of The Center for Microbes, Development and Health, Institut Pasteur Shanghai and Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai

–Founder and past chief-editor of Cellular Microbiology

-Current Chief Editor, EMBO Molecular Medicine

-Direction of 12 MD Thesis, 20 PhD Thesis and 60 post-doctoral scientists

-Publications (ISI, April 2019): 575 publications in peer-reviewed international journals, 36 000 citations,

h-index = 104, 5 active patents

Publications

• Schnupf, P., Gaboriau-Routhiau, V., Gros, M., Friedman, R., Moya-Nilges, M., Nigro, G., Cerf-Bensussan, N., Sansonetti, P.J., 2015. Growth and host interaction of mouse segmented filamentous bacteria in vitro. Nature 520, 99–103. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature14027
• Anderson, M.C., Vonaesch, P., Saffarian, A., Marteyn, B.S., Sansonetti, P.J., 2017. Shigella sonnei
  • Encodes a Functional T6SS Used for Interbacterial Competition and Niche Occupancy. Cell Host
  • Microbe 21, 769–776.e3. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chom.2017.05.004
• Aymeric, L., Donnadieu, F., Mulet, C., Merle, L. du, Nigro, G., Saffarian, A., Bérard, M., Poyart, C., Robine, S., Regnault, B., Trieu-Cuot, P., Sansonetti, P.J., Dramsi, S., 2018. Colorectal cancer specific conditions promote Streptococcus gallolyticus gut colonization. PNAS 115, E283–E291. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1715112115
• Vonaesch, P., Morien, E., Andrianonimiadana, L., Sanke, H., Mbecko, J.-R., Huus, K.E., Naharimanananirina, T., Gondje, B.P., Nigatoloum, S.N., Vondo, S.S., Kandou, J.E.K., Randremanana, R., Rakotondrainipiana, M., Mazel, F., Djorie, S.G., Gody, J.-C., Finlay, B.B., Rubbo, P.-A., Parfrey, L.W., Collard, J.-M.,
  • Sansonetti, P.J., Investigators, T.A., 2018. Stunted childhood growth is associated with
  • decompartmentalization of the gastrointestinal tract and overgrowth of oropharyngeal taxa. PNAS 115, E8489–E8498. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1806573115
• Saffarian, A., Mulet, C., Regnault, B., Amiot, A., Tran-Van-Nhieu, J., Ravel, J., Sobhani, I., Sansonetti, P.J., Pédron, T., 2019. Crypt- and Mucosa-Associated Core Microbiotas in Humans and Their Alteration in Colon Cancer Patients. MBio 10. https://doi.org/10.1128/mBio.01315-19

About

Name: Pablo Sanz Jimenez

Current Affiliation: Huazhong Agricultural University

Position: PhD student

Research

Research field: Bioinformatics and Biotechnology.

Research interests:

• Study of the genome and transcriptome of different varieties and hybrid rice.

Keywords and techniques: Transcriptomics, genomics, circRNA, lncRNA, 3D genome analysis, rice

Biosketch

Graduate in Biotechnology from the University of Leon (2014). Master of Science in Biomedical Research from the University of Valencia (2015). Master of Science in Bioinformatics from Huazhong Agricultural University (2018).

Publications

• Zhou R*, Sanz-Jimenez P*, Zhu XT, et al. Analysis of Rice Transcriptome Reveals the LncRNA/CircRNA Regulation in Tissue Development. Rice (N Y). 2021;14(1):14. Published 2021 Jan 28. doi:10.1186/s12284-021-00455-2

About

Name: Bernhard Schaefke

Current Affiliation: Brain Cognition and Brain Disease Institute (Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences)

Position: Associate Professor

Research

Research field: Evolutionary and Medical Systems Biology

Research interest: 

• Etiology and treatment of autism spectrum disorders and related comorbidities
• Gene regulatory divergence and speciation
• Gene regulation in neurodevelopment and social behavior
• Stress and sleep

Keywords and techniques: Gene regulatory evolution, genetic incompatibility and speciation, autism spectrum disorders, gut-brain axis, social behaviors, fear & anxiety, sleep. Next generation sequencing, biomedical informatics and statistics, evolutionary and comparative analysis, automated animal behavior video capture and classification.

Biosketch

Dr. Bernhard Schaefke is an evolutionary biologist, bioinformatician and neuroscientist. He is an associate professor at the Brain Cognition and Brain Disease Institute (Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences).

He pursued his Ph.D. in the Taiwan International Graduate Program at Academia Sinica and Yang-Ming University in Taipei, studying gene expression divergence in yeasts. As a research assistant professor at Southern University of Science and Technology in Shenzhen he investigated the evolutionary dynamics of posttranscriptional gene regulation in mice. The focus of his current research are the gene-gene and gene-environment interactions involved in the etiology of autism spectrum disorders and the gene expression patterns associated with symptom severity and clinical improvement.

Publications

• Tseng YT, Zhao B, Chen S, Ye J, Liu J, Liang L, Ding H, Schaefke B, Yang Q, Wang L, Wang F, Wang L. The subthalamic corticotropin-releasing hormone neurons mediate adaptive REM-sleep responses to threat. Neuron. 2022 Apr 6;110(7):1223-1239.e8. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2021.12.033.
• Zou XD*, Schaefke B*, Li YS, Jia F, Sun W, Li G, Liang W, Reif T, Heyd F, Gao Q, Tian S, Li Y, Tang Y, Fang L, Hu Y, & Chen W. Mammalian splicing divergence is shaped by drift, buffering in trans and a scaling law. Life Sci Alliance. 2021 Dec 30;5(4):e202101333. doi: 10.26508/lsa.202101333.
  * First author
• Li YS*, Schaefke B*^§, Zou XD, Zhang M, Heyd F, Sun W, Zhang B, Li G, Liang W, He Y, Zhou J, Li Y, Fang L, Hu Y, & Chen W ^§. Pan-tissue analysis of allelic alternative polyadenylation suggests widespread functional regulation. Mol Syst Biol. 2020 Apr;16(4):e9367. doi:10.15252/msb.20199367.
  * First author, ^§ Corresponding author
• Schaefke B*^§, Sun W*, Li YS*, Fang L, & Chen W^§. The evolution of posttranscriptional regulation. Wiley Interdiscip Rev RNA. 2018, e1485. doi:10.1002/wrna.1485.
  * First author, ^§ Corresponding author
• Schaefke B*, Wang TY, Wang CY, & Li WH. Gains and Losses of Transcription Factor Binding Sites in Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Saccharomyces paradoxus. Genome Biol Evol. 2015, 7(8), 2245-2257. doi:10.1093/gbe/evv138
  * First author

About

Name: Agathe Serres

Current Affiliation: Marine Mammal and Marine Bioacoustics Laboratory, Institute of Deep-sea Science and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Position:  Postdoctoral researcher 

Research

Research field:  Ethology, Cetology, Conservation 

Research interest: 

• Cetaceans
• Acoustics
• Behaviour
• Welfare
• Conservation
• Human impacts 

Keywords and techniques: Dolphin, Porpoise, Acoustic signals, Behaviour, Welfare assessment, Population monitoring, Anthropogenic disturbances

Biosketch

Agathe Serres has a Biology Bachelor’s degree, an Ethology Master’s degree, and a Hydrobiology Ph.D. degree. She has been working on cetaceans in natural settings and under human care for ten years and focuses her research on the behaviour, welfare, and acoustics of dolphins and porpoises. She has worked on bottlenose dolphins, Yangtze finless porpoises, East-Asian finless porpoises, and Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins. Through her research work, Agathe aims to increase our understanding of these animals to improve their living condition under human care and protect them in the wild. 

Publications

• Serres A, Lin W, Liu B, Chen S, Li S (2024). Skinny dolphins: Can poor body condition explain population decline in Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins (Sousa chinensis)? Science of the Total Environment. 917, 170401. 
• Serres A, Lin W, Liu B, Chen S, Li S (2023). Context of breaching and tail slapping in Indo Pacific humpback dolphins in the northern South China Sea, Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 77, 64. 
• Serres A, Lin W, Liu B, Lin M, Liu M, Li S (2023). Injuries and skin condition of Indo‐Pacific humpback dolphins Sousa chinensis in the northern South China Sea, Marine Mammal Science, 39, 1215-1239. 
• Serres A, Hao Y, Wang D (2022). Socio sexual Interactions in Captive Finless Porpoises and Bottlenose Dolphins, Marine Mammal Science, 28, 812-821. 
• Serres A, Delfour F (2017). Environmental changes and anthropogenic factors modulate social play in captive bottlenose dolphins Tursiops truncatus, Zoo Biology, 36, 99-111 

About

Name: Marta Filipa Simões

Current Affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Lunar and Planetary Sciences (SKLPlanets), Macau University of Science and Technology (MUST)

Position: Assistant Professor

Research

Research field: Astrobiology

Research interest: 

• Mycology
• Astromycology
• Applied Mycology

Keywords and techniques: Filamentous fungi, Microgravity, Fungal adaptations, Fungal applications, Mycogenic metal nanoparticles, Fungal enzymes

Biosketch

Marta Filipa Simões is a microbiologist who has worked with a myriad of microorganisms (mycobacteria, environmental and clinical bacteria, mycobacteriophages, yeasts, and filamentous fungi) and has a multidisciplinary background mainly focused on mycology (filamentous fungi).

She graduated in Biotechnological Engineering from Lusófona University (Universidade Lusófona de Humanidades e Tecnologias, Lisbon), did a Master in Clinical Microbiology at the Faculty of Medicine from the University of Lisbon, and a Ph.D. in Chemical and Biological Engineering at the Biological Engineering Center from the University of Minho, in Portugal. She has done a postdoc in Saudi Arabia at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), and has worked in the UK at Edge Hill University (EHU) as a senior biology technician, a junior research fellow, and an associate tutor.

She is currently based at Macau (China), where she is working on astrobiology in the State Key Laboratory of Lunar and Planetary Sciences (SKLPlanets), at Macau University of Science and Technology (MUST). Her current work focuses mostly on astromycology: fungal ecology, biodiversity in environmental analogues to outer-space conditions, bioprospection and application of filamentous fungi, and fungal growth containment and exploitation in simulating conditions of outer space.

Twitter: @Simoes_MF

ResearchGate: www.researchgate.net/profile/Marta_Simes

Google scholar: https://scholar.google.pt/citations?user=sm5g6nsAAAAJ&hl=pt-PT

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/martafilipasimoes

Lab link: www.must.edu.mo/en/ssi/astrobiology

Personal link: www.must.edu.mo/images/SSI/cv/Astrobiology/Marta_Simoes.pdf

Institution link: www.must.edu.mo/en/ssi

Publications

• Simões, M.F.*, Cortesão, M., Azua-Bustos, A., Bai, F.-Y., Canini, F., Casadevall, A., Cassaro, A., Cordero, R.J.B., Fairén, A.G., González-Silva, C., Gunde-Cimerman, N., Koch, S., Liu, X.-Z., Onofri, S., Pacelli, C., Selbmann, L., Tesei, D., Waghmode, A., Wang, T., Zucconi, L. & Antunes* A. (2023). The relevance of fungi in astrobiology research – Astromycology. Mycosphere 14(1): 1190–1253. DOI: 10.5943/mycosphere/14/1/13.
• Simões, M.F.* & Antunes, A. (2021). Microbial pathogenicity in space. Pathogens, 10(4): 450, DOI: 3390/pathogens10040450.
• Méndez, A., Rivera-Valentín, E.G., Schulze-Makuch, D., Filiberto, J., Ramírez, R., Wood, T.E., Dávila, A., McKay, C., Ceballos, K.O., Jusino-Maldonado, M., Torres-Santiago, N., Heller, R., Byrne, P., Malaska, M.J., Nathan, E., Simões, M.F., Antunes, A., Martínez-Frías, J., Carone, L., Izenberg, N.R., Atri, D., Chitty, H.I.C., Nowajewski-Barra, P., Rivera-Hernández, F., Brown, C., Lynch, K., Catling, D., Zuluaga, J.I., Salazar, J.F., Chen, H., González, G., Jagadeesh, M.K. & Haqq-Misra, J. (2021). Habitability Models for Planetary Sciences. Astrobiology, 21, 8. DOI: 10.1089/ast.2020.2342.
• Simões, M.F.*, Ottoni, C.A. & Antunes, A. (2020). Biogenic metal nanoparticles: a new approach to detect life on Mars? Life, 10(3), 28; DOI:10.3390/life10030028.
• DasSarma, P., Antunes A., Simões, M.F. & DasSarma, S. (2020). Earth’s Stratosphere and Microbial Life. Current Issues in Molecular Biology, 38:197-244, DOI: 10.21775/cimb.038.197.

About

Name: Dr Anastasia Tsigkou

Current Affiliation: Duke Kunshan University China, Division of Natural Science

Position: Associate Professor of Biology

Research

Research field: Reproductive Biology, Ovarian Cancer

Keywords and techniques: Ovarian, Breast cancer, Progesterone Receptor, TGF-β2_&3, Inhibin. Production of Monoclonal Antibodies, Molecular and Proteins work, Immunostaining.

Biosketch

Dr Anastasia Tsigkou, is an Associate Professor of Biology at Duke Kunshan University China, Division of Natural Science. She held a lecturer Position at Xian Jiatong Liverpool University (XJTLU), Department of Biological Sciences (Suzhou China), teaching Biochemistry, Biotechnology, and Cancer Biology. She obtained her degrees with Honours at The University of Melbourne Australia (BSc) majoring in Biochemistry and her DPhil from Oxford/Brookes University UK. She also obtained a postgraduate certificate in science at Brookes University UK.

Her research focuses on the area of reproductive biology particular the study of Inhibin and Progesterone receptors in uterine leiomyomas and ovarian cancers. One of her main achievements was the development of a novel immunoassay Inhibin total (A&B) (Inhibin-TGF-β family). The development of the assay led to the successfully licensing of the antibodies and assays with total royalty income to Oxford and Brookes University over two million GBP. She has had several research grants, most recent, NSFC (National Natural Science Foundation of China) for the study of MMPs in cancer biology, a regional grant of Guangdong in collaboration with XJTLU for the development of a novel immunoassay to Vitamin D binding proteins.

Publications

• Jiang B, Zhang Y, Liu J, Tsigkou A, Rapti M, Lee MH. Ensnaring membrane type 1-matrix metalloproteinase (MTI-MMP) with tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinase (TIMP)-2 using the haemopexin domain of the protease as a carrier: a targeted approach in cancer inhibition. Oncotarget. 2017 Apr 4;8(14):22685-22699
• Anastasia Tsigkou; Meng Huee Lee. ADAMTS13 and 15 are Not Inhibited by the Full Length and N-terminal Domain Forms of Tissue Inhibitor of Metalloproteinase (TIMP)-1, -2, -3 and -4 Biomed Rep. 2016 Jan;4(1):73-78.
• Fernando M. Reis, Petraglia Felice, Fangrong Shen, Meng Huee Lee, Claudia Tosti, Bingie Jiang Chen You Guo, Tsigkou. A . Increased progesterone receptor expression in uterine leiomyoma: correlation with age, number of leiomyomas, and clinical symptoms, Journal of Fertil Steril. 2015 Jul;104(1):170-5
• Fernando M. Reis, Petraglia Felice, Fangrong Shen, Meng Huee Lee, Claudia Tosti, Chen You Guo, Bingie Jiang Tsigkou A. et al. Expression levels of myostatin and matrix metalloproteinase 14 mRNAs in uterine leiomyoma are correlated with dysmenorrhea Reprod Sci. 2015 Jul
• Tsigkou A et al. High serum inhibin concentration discriminates autoimmune oophoritis from other forms of primary ovarian insufficiency. Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2008 Jan;(22):1263-9

About

Name: TZVETANOV Tzvetomir 

Current Affiliation:

China: 赐为科学研究（深圳）有限公司 

EU/France : NEUROPSYPHY Tzvetomir TZVETANOV EIRL

Position:  Senior Scientist  

Research

Research field:  Sensory processing; computational modeling; non-invasive measures of neural systems 

Research interest: 

• Visual perception
• Psychophysics
• Fast efficient methods for psychophysics measures
• Correlations between behavioral (psychophysics) and EEG measures
• Aging
• Engineering Biology 

Keywords and techniques: psychophysics, perceptual systems, computational modeling, vision, EEG 

Biosketch

Studies in Physics (DEA – Diplôme d’Etudes Approfondies – in Subatomic Physics, Experimentation and Simulations, 1998) and PhD (2003) in Strasbourg (France) in Life Sciences, speciality sensory psychology; postdoc in Goettingen (Germany, 2004-2008, German Primate Center) and one independent DFG research grant in Hanover (Germany, 2008-2011, Leibniz University Hanover); work topics on visual perception of motion, psychophysics of attentional modulation of centre-surround interactions, computational modelling of the motion repulsion effect, modelling of spatial attention effects on receptive field profiles (neurophysiological data), psychophysics of spatial and feature-based attention, psychophysics of spatio-orientation interactions, low-level processes for rapid processing of images, psychophysics and modelling of center-surround interactions in motion and orientation domain; break as dad-at-home (2010-2013); 2013-2020 work in Hefei (China) as a Research Associate (2013-2016, University of Science and Technology of China) and Associate Professor (2017-2020, Hefei University of Technology); topics investigated: neural basis of visual impairment in Amblyopia and visual changes in Ageing populations through psychophysics and computational modelling, center-surround interactions in orientation and motion processing, Bayesian method for optimal psychophysics parameters extraction, emotion effects on human-robot interactions with psychophysics and EEG measures.  

Publications

• Huang, J., Zhou, Y., & Tzvetanov, T. (2023). Influences of local and global context on local orientation perception. European Journal of Neuroscience, 58(6), 3503–3517 
• Liu, J.; Zhou, Y. & Tzvetanov, T. (2018) Globally Normal Bistable Motion Perception of Anisometropic Amblyopes May Profit From an Unusual Coding Mechanism, Frontiers in Neuroscience, 12, 391 
• Wang, Z.; Yu, S.; Fu, Y.; Tzvetanov, T. & Zhou, Y. (2018) Aging Potentiates Lateral but Not Local Inhibition of Orientation Processing in Primary Visual Cortex, Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, 10, 14 
• Tzvetanov, T. Suppression and facilitation of motion perception in humans, bioRxiv/465807, 2018, DOI: 10.1101/465807 
• Huang, J.; Zhou, Y.; Liu, C.; Liu, Z.; Luan, C. & Tzvetanov, T. The neural basis of spatial vision losses in the dysfunctional visual system, Scientific Reports, 2017, 7, 11376

About

Name: Svetlana Ugarcina Perovic

Current affiliation: Fudan University, Shanghai

Position: Postdoctoral Researcher

Research

Research field: Computational microbiome

Research interests:

• Global microbiome
• Antimicrobial resistome

Keywords and techniques: metagenomics, computational microbiology, antimicrobial resistance genes

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Publications

• Magdalena Ksiezarek, Teresa G Ribeiro, Joana Rocha, Filipa Grosso, Svetlana Ugarcina Perovic, Luisa Peixe (2021) Limosilactobacillus urinaemulieris sp. nov. and Limosilactobacillus portuensis sp. nov. isolated from urine of healthy women. International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology 71(3), DOI: 10.1099/ijsem.0.004726.
• Magdalena Ksiezarek, Svetlana Ugarcina Perovic, Joana Rocha, Filipa Grosso, Luísa Peixe (2021) Long-term stability of the urogenital microbiota of asymptomatic European women. BMC microbiology 21 (1), 1-11. DOI: 10.1186/s12866-021-02123-3

About

Name: Prof. Dr. Stijn van der Veen

Current Affiliation: School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, China

Position: Professor

Research

Research field: Medical microbiology, infectious diseases, bacterial pathogens

Research interests:

• Epidemiology of antimicrobial resistance and resistance mechanisms in bacterial clinical isolates
• Development of novel antimicrobial compounds for treatment of multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens
• Bacterial vaccine development, with a focus on Neisseria gonorrhoeae
• Host-microbe interactions, bacterial invasion and intracellular survival of epithelial cells

Keywords and techniques: Neisseria gonorrhoeae, Neisseria meningitidis, Listeria monocytogenes, antimicrobials, antimicrobial resistance, vaccines, host-microbe interactions, genetic engineering, protein biochemistry, animal models, cell culture, electron/confocal microscopy

Biosketch

Stijn van der Veen is fill-time professor at the Zhejiang University School of Medicine since 2014 and he served as Assistant Dean at the School of Basic Medical Sciences from 2016 to 2020. He is currently honorary lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, UK, and Adjunct Professor at the Zhejiang University Affiliated Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital and also at the State Key Laboratory for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Disease at the Zhejiang University First Affiliated Hospital. He also recently launched a new English-language international journal in China (Infectious Microbes & Diseases) as Executive Editor, which is based at the Zhejiang University First Affiliated Hospital. Prof Stijn van der Veen has been engaged in bacterial pathogen research for 17 years, including 7 years (PhD and Postdoc) at Wageningen University (Netherlands) studying Listeria monocytogenes, 3 years (Postdoc) at the University of Oxford (UK) studying Neisseria meningitidis, and 7 years at Zhejiang University studying Neisseria gonorrhoeae, N. meningitidis and L. monocytogenes. His current research is focused on antimicrobial resistance, development of alternative prophylactic and therapeutic treatments, including novel antimicrobials and vaccines, and host-microbe interactions. These studies have already resulted in more than 50 publications in international highly regarded SCI journal that include Journal of Infectious Diseases, Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, PLoS Pathogens, Emerging Microbes & Infections and Nature Reviews Microbiology, which already accumulated more than 1600 citations.

Publications

• High percentage of the ceftriaxone-resistant Neisseria gonorrhoeae FC428 clone among isolates from a single hospital in Hangzhou, China. Yan J, Chen Y, Yang F, Ling X, Jiang S, Zhao F, Yu Y, van der Veen S. J Antimicrob Chemother. 2021 Mar 12;76(4):936-939. doi: 10.1093/jac/dkaa526
• Gonococcal adaptation to palmitic acid through farAB expression and FadD activity mutations increases in vivo fitness in a murine genital tract infection model. Gao L, Wang Z, van der Veen S. J Infect Dis. 2021 Jul 2;224(1):141-150. doi: 10.1093/infdis/jiaa701
• Role of base excision repair in Listeria monocytogenes DNA stress survival during infections. Zhang J, Wang S, Abee T, van der Veen S. J Infect Dis. 2021 Feb 24;223(4):721-732. doi: 10.1093/infdis/jiaa412
• A subpopulation of intracellular Neisseria gonorrhoeae escapes autophagy-mediated killing inside epithelial cells. Lu P, Wang S, Lu Y, Neculai D, Sun Q, van der Veen S. J Infect Dis. 2019 Jan 1;219(1):133-144. doi: 10.1093/infdis/jiy237
• Gonococcal MtrE and its surface-expressed Loop 2 are immunogenic and elicit bactericidal antibodies. Wang S, Xue J, Lu P, Ni C, Cheng H, Han R, van der Veen S. J Infect. 2018 Sep;77(3):191-204. doi: 10.1016/j.jinf.2018.06.001.

About

Name: Deniz Vatansever

Current Affiliation: Institute of Science and Technology for Brain-inspired Intelligence, Fudan University, 200433 Shanghai, China

Position: Associate Professor (Full) / Junior Principal Investigator

Research

Research field: Human Cognitive Neuroscience, Neuroimaging

Research Interests

• The role of default mode network in human cognition and mental nagivation
• Neural mechanisms supporting automaticity, cognitive biases and heuristics
• Precision mapping of brain functional and structural network architecture
• Biometric, psychometric, and neuropsychological assessment of cognitive processes
• Neural decoding with machine learning and brain-inspired artificial intelligence approaches

Keywords and techniques: Human Cognition, Neuroimaging, Default Mode Network, Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Systems Neuroscience, Neurocognition, Neuroeconomics, Neuroaesthetics, Automaticity, Cognitive Control, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning

Biosketch

Dr. Deniz Vatansever is an Associate Professor (Full) and Junior Principal Investigator within the Behavioural and Cognitive Neurosciences Centre at the Institute of Science and Technology for Brain-Inspired Intelligence, Fudan University. Prior to his move to Shanghai in 2019, he obtained his PhD from the University of Cambridge in Clinical Neurosciences at the Cognition and Consciousness Imaging Group, and later joined the Department of Psychology, Semantics and Mind-wandering Lab at the University of York for his post-doctoral work. As the group leader of Brain-inspired Intelligence and Adaptive Systems (BIAS) Laboratory, his currentresearch goal is to unravel the neural mechanisms underlying behavioural automaticity as well as cognitive biases and heuristics. In addition to making significant contributions to our understanding of normal and abnormal brain function in humans, his long-term research aim is to inspire the development of future generation artificial intelligence. Employing integrative approaches from cognitive, comparative, computational and clinical neurosciences, his primary research spans areas such as object and concept classification, value-based decision making, aesthetic experience, conscious cognition, and neural plasticity. For that purpose, his team combines neural information gained from ultra-high resolution magnetic resonance imaging with advanced biometric assessments as well as cognitive and psychometric tests. In addition to receiving competitive research grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China, he has published hisresearch findings in international journals including Nature Communications, Journal of Neuroscience, Human Brain Mapping, Neuroimage and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA.

Publications

• Vatansever D., Smallwood J, Jefferies E. (2021). Varying demands for cognitive control reveals shared neural processes supporting semantic and episodic memory retrieval. Nature Communications. 12(1): 2134.
• Vatansever D, Schröter M, Adapa RM, Bullmore ET, Menon DK, Stamatakis ES. (2020). Reorganisation of brain hubs across altered states of consciousness. Scientific Reports, 10(1):3402.
• Vatansever D, Karapanagiotidis T, Margulies DS, Jefferies E, Smallwood J. (2020). Distinct patterns of thought mediate the link between brain functional connectomes and well-being. Network Neuroscience, 4(3):637-657.
• Vatansever D., Menon DK, Stamatakis EA. (2018). Default mode contributions to automated information processing. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA. 114(48): 12821-12826.
• Vatansever D, Menon DK, Manktelow AE, Sahakian BJ, Stamatakis EA. (2015). Default mode dynamics for global functional integration. The Journal of Neuroscience: The Official Journal of the Society for Neuroscience, 35(46), 15254-15262.