She has done MS Analytical Chemistry from University of Nebraska, Ph.D. Analytical Chemistry, Iowa State University, Her research includes characterizing the small molecules in natural systems to understand how they interact synergistically in maintaining the energy balance in mammalian cells. As such, she have collaborated with other experts in the nutritional/biomedical area to link specific dietary metabolites to potential health outcomes. Her experience in dietary metabolites, background in pharmaceuticals, and education as a bioanalytical chemist provides the foundation needed to achieve her long term goals.

Synergistic interactions of secondary metabolites on maintaining the energy balance / fluxes in mammalian cells. Synergistic interactions of secondary metabolites of plant systems on phenotypic switches (e.g. inflammation (M1 to M2 states) and virulent bacteria). Effects of farming practices on secondary metabolites in various crops, with an emphasis on dry edible beans, strawberries, wheat and tomatoes. Development of high-throughput metabolomic analytical methods.

Wei Jia is Professor and Co-Director of the Center for Translational Biomedical Research, the University of North Carolina-Greensboro. He also serves as Director of the Metabolomics Core Lab at the David H Murdock Research Institute, Kannapolis, North Carolina. Jia was previously Professor and Vice Dean, School of Pharmacy, Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China, and has worked nearly a decade on biochemical profiling of botanical preparations and metabolomics. Professor Jia’s current research focuses on mass spectrometry (MS)-based metabolomics profiling technologies to investigate metabolic phenotypes and metabolic transformation in cancer and metabolic disorders.

Metabonomic study of disorders, including diabetes, obesity, and colorectal cancer.

Ryals received his Ph. D. in Molecular Biology from the University of Texas at Dallas in 1982. Following post doctoral work in the lab of Charles Weissmann at the Institute for Molecular Biology at the University of Zurich, Ryals joined Ciba-Geigy in the Biotechnology Research Unit at Research Triangle Park (now Syngenta). Ryals worked in various research and management positions including Head, Agricultural Biotechnology Research, Vice-President of Biotechnology, Vice-President, Research for Novartis Crop Protection, Inc. and Head of the Biotechnology and Genomics Center of Novartis, Inc. In 1997, Ryals founded Paradigm Genetics, Inc., an early systems biology company, and served as the Chief Executive Officer, Chief Science Officer and President and taking the company public in 2000. After leaving Paradigm Genetics in 2002, Ryals joined Metabolon, Inc. as Chief Executive Officer and President. For the past 10 years, Ryals research interest has been in the development of metabolomics to aid in pharmaceutical drug discovery and development, healthcare and nutrition. Metabolon, Inc. is a diagnostics and commercial services company offering the industry’s leading biochemical profiling platform. Metabolon has performed over 2000 studies to date with involving more than 500 customers and collaborators. Among these studies, Metabolon has conducted over 300 studies on cancer and in particular in contrasting various types of cancer and discovering biomarkers that can be used to differentiate various forms of the disease.

Development of metabolomics to aid in pharmaceutical drug discovery and development, healthcare and nutrition.

Zuyi (Jacky) Huang completed his Ph.D. from Texas A&M University in 2010 and then worked as a Research Scientist in the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine. He joined the Department of Chemical Engineering at Villanova University as an Assistant Professor in 2011. He is now the director of Computational Systems Biology Lab at Villanova University. He has published 18 papers in reputed journals. He is now serving as an editorial board member of Journal of Computer Science & Systems Biology. He is also serving on the International Federation of Automatic Control (IFAC) Policy Committee.

1) deriving quantitative data for transcription factors by analyzing GFP images and solving an inverse problem; 2)integrating available qualitative information into modeling by using Fuzzy logic;3) performing nonlinear model reduction of uncertain systems; 4) sensor network and experimental design for chemical plants

Xue-Long Sun is an Associate Professor and has been promoted to a Full Professor (2012) in the Department of Chemistry, Cleveland State University and holds an adjunct faculty position at the Department of Molecular Cardiology, Cleveland Clinic since 2007. Dr. Sun earned his Ph.D. degree in Pharmaceutical Chemistry from Kitasato University School of Pharmacy, Tokyo, Japan. He has published 73 peer-reviewed research articles and book chapters. He has been trained as carbohydrate chemist working on synthesis and characterization of sialic acid derivatives during graduate research and glycosaminoglycan mimetics during postdoctoral research. Recently, he is working on glyco-macroligand-based microarray and biosensor for proteomics, pathogen identification; glyco-affinity macroligand engineering for glycoproteomics and glycomics research. In addition, he has worked on synthesis and characterization of lipid and glycolipid derivatives for more than ten years. He has been a Guest Editor for a Special Issue (2010, 30 (2)) of Carbohydrate Recognition and Applications for Medicinal Research Reviews (Wiley InterScience).

Metabolomics

Laszlo Vigh, Director, Hungarian Academy Of Sciences.

Leucocyte research and molecular and chemical patterns.

Viktor Stolc is the director of the NASA Ames Genome Research Facility (Mountain View, CA), where he has pioneered the development of large-scale functional genomics projects, including high resolution tiling arrays for the entire human genome and various model organisms. Prior to joining NASA in 2000, Stolc worked as a Damon Runyon Cancer Research post-doctoral fellow at Stanford University Genome Technology Center (Palo Alto, CA), where he co-invented a method for direct multiplex characterization of genomic DNA. Dr. Stolc received his doctoral degree from Yale University School of Medicine, Department of Cell Biology (New Haven, CT), where he identified and characterized nuclear RNase P protein components from humans and yeast.

Characterization of dynamic sequence variations caused by metabolic oxidation, and identification of the physical basis for universal feedback mechanism between heredity and the environment.

Laura Bindila is Scientist within Luxembourg Clinical Proteomics laboratory, at the Centre de Recherche Publique de la Sante, Strassen, Luxembourg. She carried out her PhD program at University of Munster, Institute for Medical Physics and Biophysics and defended her thesis at the Babes Bolyai University of Cluj Napoca, Romania. She continued her potdoctoral and scientific career at the University of Munster till January 2010 when she moved to Luxemborug Clinical Proteomics laboratory. She has published more than 25 articles, including reviews. She has teaching experience of more than 5 years. She is member of graduate school in Molecular and Cellular Glyco-Sciences (University of Munster) and served as member in Erasmus exchange programs between european universities. She served as a reviewer of peer-reviewed journals in the area of glycobiology, lipidomics and proteomcis. She is member of organizing committee of the Summer School for Mass Spectrometry in Biotechnology and Medicine. She received the Summa cum laudae title for her PhD thesis.

Metabolomics

Ralph Zahn joined BIOCRATES in October 2010 as chief technology officer for the further development of the product pipeline and the affiliated technical and scientific assignments. He holds a PhD in natural science and has a wealth of experience in the field of biotech. After he graduated from biology, he worked as research associate and earned the doctors degree in 1994 at the Max-Planck-Institute for Biochemistry in Munich. At the Cambridge University he obtained a post-graduate doctor degree. He habilitated 2001 at the Institute for Molecular Biology and Biophysics at the Eidgenössischen Technischen Hochschule in Zurich. During his career, he was managing director at BioSafety GmbH and founder and CEO of allprion AG.

Mukesh Verma is a Program Director and Chief in the Methods and Technologies Branch (MTB), Epidemiology and Genetics Research Program (EGRP) of the Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS) at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), National Institutes of Health (NIH). Before coming to the DCCPS, he was a Program Director in the Division of Cancer Prevention (DCP), NCI, providing direction in the areas of biomarkers, early detection, risk assessment and prevention of cancer, and cancers associated with infectious agents. Mukesh Verma holds a M.Sc. from Pantnagar University and a Ph.D. from Banaras Hindu University. He did postdoctoral research at George Washington University and was a faculty member at Georgetown University. He has published 125 research articles and reviews and edited four books in cancer epigenetics and epidemiology field. Verma has developed concepts (PA and RFA) on exfoliated cells and circulating DNA and their application in cancer detection and risk assessment, cancer epidemiology, risk prediction models in cancer, mitochondrial DNA and cancer epidemiology, cancer epigenetics, pancreatic cancer etiology, AIDS related malignancies, and systems genetics. Verma represents NCI in NIH Common Funds Metabolomics and NIH Roadmap Epigenomics. He also served as the Project Officer for an Inter Agency Agreement with CDC with focus on biomarkers of cervical cancer.

Cancer epidemiology, risk prediction models in cancer, mitochondrial DNA and cancer epidemiology, cancer epigenetics, pancreatic cancer etiology, AIDS related malignancies, and systems genetics.

George G Chen is a professor in the Department of Surgery, Director of Surgical Research Laboratories, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China. He is also served as a principle investigator at the Hong Kong Cancer Institute. He has extensive experience in cancer research, particularly in the area of apoptosis in hepatocellular carcinoma, lung caner and thyroid cancer. He has authored or co-authored ~120 papers and has written a number of books or book chapters. He is currently a member of editorial boards or a guest editor of a number of scientific journals and a regular peer-reviewer for several grant agents. He was educated in China and United Kingdom and has MB and PhD degrees.

Metabolomics

Mario Hugo Genero, MD is a cofounder and scientific Director of BMG BioPharma. He has received a MD degree from Buenos Aires University, Buenos Aires, Argentina (1990). Adjunct professor of Medical Genetics, Austral University (2005-2009). He has served as Council Member of The Human Proteome Project (HUPO) for two period (2003-2009). He is serving as coordinator of the Latin America HUPO. He is participating in the cardiovascular Initiative at HUPO. He also is serving at the Education and Training Committee of The Human Proteome Project (HUPO) as coordinator of specific educational needs of “Proteomics less advanced countries”.

Medical Genetics,Vascular Therapy

Vidya Velagapudi obtained her PhD in Applied Biochemistry from Univresity of Saarland in collaboration with the Max-Plank Institute for Informatics, Germany in 2005. Later on she moved to VTT, Finland as a post-doctral fellow and continued as a Research Scientist and Project manager during 2006-2009. In 2010, Dr. Velagapudi has taken up the role of Head of the Metabolomics Unit at Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland (FIMM). From 2012 omwards Dr. velagapudi is also affiliation to University of Helsinki as an Adjunct professor. Dr. Velagapudi has published more than 25 scientific articles in international journals and also acting as editorial board member and reviewer for the journals in the field of metabolomics.

Metabolomics

Professor Alexander A. Kamnev is a Leading Scientist at the Institute of Biochemistry and Physiology of Plants and Microorganisms, Russian Academy of sciences (Saratov, Russia). He received his MSc in chemistry (1980), Cand. Sci. (PhD equivalent; 1992) and DSc (2002) in physical chemistry from Saratov State University. His scientific background included chemistry and electrochemistry of transition-metal hydroxide materials.

Plant Biochemistry

Studied in Politechnica University of Timisoara

Automation and Applied Informatics

John A. McLean is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry at Vanderbilt University and a faculty fellow in the Institute of Chemical Biology and Institute of Integrative Biosystems Research and Education. His recent awards include an Excellence in Teaching Award from the student members of the American Chemical Society, a Defense Threat Reduction Agency Research Award, an American Society for Mass Spectrometry Research Award, a Spectroscopy Society of Pittsburgh Award, an R&D 100 Award, and the Bunsen–Kirchhoff Prize from the GDCh. He has published over 60 manuscripts in the peer-reviewed literature, 8 book chapters, and 15 patents.

Chemical Biology

Guanyu Wang has completed his Ph.Ds from Zhejiang University in 1998 and from University of Cologne in 2005. He completed his postdoctoral studies from University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Rice University. He is now an assistant professor of Physics at George Washington University. He has published more than 30 papers in reputed journals and serving as an editorial board member of Journal of Biochemistry and Analytic Biochemistry.

Analytic Biochemistry

Neil Price is a government research scientist at the USDA’S National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research (USDA-NCAUR) in Peoria, IL. He has a Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of London (1990), and research experience at the John Innes Institute, Norwich, U.K., University of Geneva, Switzerland, and Paul-Sabatier University in Toulouse, France, before joining the Complex Carbohydrate research Center in Athens, GA. He previously held a faculty position at the Dept. of Pharmacology, U. of Rochester, NY, before joining the USDA-NCAUR national laboratory in 2003. EMBO fellowship (1990); CNRS-INRA (France) Postdoctoral Fellowship (1991); Procter and Gamble Exploratory Research Prize (1997); American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB, 1994 – present); American society for Mass Spectrometry (2003 –present).

Plant Biochemistry, Mass Spectromerty

Alan Prem Kumar earned his PhD from University of North Texas, USA. From his PhD work, he discovered a novel regulatory protein, PyrR for pyrimidine biosynthetic pathway in Pseudomonas, Because pyrimidine biosynthesis is an essential step in the progression of secondary Pseudomonas infection, PyrR presents an attractive anti-Pseudomonal drug target. Dr. Kumar then pursued Postdoctoral training in Cancer Research at Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center, California, USA. He was awarded a postdoctoral Fellowship for his work on the role of nuclear receptors in the transcriptional regulation of human myeloperoxidase, a leukocyte enzyme implicated as causative agent in atherosclerosis and Alzheimer’s disease. Dr. Kumar relocated back to Singapore to join the Faculty of Medicine, National University of Singapore as an independent Principal Investigator to continue on his expertise on nuclear receptor amd cancer biology. His current research interest includes the role of nuclear receptors involved in the regulation of target genes and elucidate mechanism and association signal pathways. Another area of interest is aimed at developing new derivative drugs with hopefully fewer side effects.

Metabolomics