Viral Outbreaks and Epidemiology

Dr. Farshad Guirakhoo, a virologist by training, was named one of the 50 Most Influential People in Vaccines in VaccineNation’s 2014 list. His most recent assignment was CTO at Vaxess Technologies. Prior to this, he served as CSO at Hookipa Biotech and Executive Director of External R&D at Sanofi Pasteur. Before joining Sanofi Pasteur in 2007, he was with Acambis for 15 years as Head of Research and co-invented the ChimeriVax-technology platform in association with St. Louis University. This platform has successfully been applied in the development of vaccines such as IMOJEV™, PreVenile™, Dengvaxia™, and WN human vaccine. Dr. Guirakhoo has broad experience in the application of gene expression technologies and molecular virology for the construction and production of recombinant proteins, human antibodies, and attenuated viral vectored vaccines for the prevention and treatment of infectious diseases. Dr. Guirakhoo is the author of over 80 peer-reviewed publications and holder of multiple patents.

Application of genetics, gene expression technologies and molecular virology for the constructions and productions of recombinant proteins, human antibodies and attenuated viral vectored vaccines for prevention and treatment of infectious diseases.

Dr Kedzierska trained as a viral immunologist and has over 14 years of experience in researching the immune responses to acute (influenza) and chronic (HIV) viral infections. Her expertise in both the murine system and human settings allows her to translate any of the key findings obtained from an easily manipulated mouse model into human viral immunology. Her PhD work undertaken at the Burnet Institute in Melbourne has provided an important contribution to our knowledge of AIDS pathogenesis by proposing the mechanisms of why HIV-infected patients develop specific opportunistic infections as their disease progresses, ultimately the cause of their death. Her PhD work was recognised by prestigious awards, including a 2001 Premier’s Commendation for Medical Research, 2002 Monash University Mollie Holman Doctoral Medal for the Best PhD Thesis and the NHMRC Peter Doherty Postdoctoral Fellowship to pursue her postdoctoral research with Nobel Laureate Professor Peter Doherty. She joined Professor Doherty’s laboratory upon his return to the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Melbourne in July 2002. During the four-year postdoctoral position she has further contributed to the field of viral immunology and developed her own research interests related to the cellular and molecular aspects of CD8+ T cell immunity to influenza virus infection. After being awarded the NHMRC RD Wright Fellowship and a NHMRC Project Grant, she established her independent research group in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. She aims to understand how immunological T cell memory is generated, whether it is feasible to elicit immunity towards escape viral variants, and how T cell receptor repertoire relates to T cell phenotype, function and viral escape.

Viral immunology, T cell memory formation, influenza (Immunology).

Dr. Barakat is an Assistant Professor at the school of Pharmacy at the University of Alberta, Canada. His research stands at the multidisciplinary interface of physics, biology and computer science. Dr. Barakat’s major focus is on developing and applying state-of-the-art computational drug discovery tools to discover new antiviral and immunotherapeutic drugs. Dr. Barakat has made great contributions in understanding the nature and biophysical processes underlying protein–drug, protein–protein and drug off-target interactions and predicting drug-mediated toxicity. He also received numerous awards including the CIHR and AIHS postdoctoral fellowships, the prestigious University of Alberta dissertation award and many distinction awards throughout his undergraduate and graduate studies. Dr. Barakat is also the editor of the Journal of Pharmaceutical Care & Health Systems and serves as a guest reviewer for several journals.

Host Immune Defences & Immunotherapy

Hiroshi Ohrui was born in 1942. He received his B.S. (1965) and Ph.D. degrees (1971) from The University of Tokyo under the direction of Professor Masanao Matsui. He joined RIKEN in 1966 as a researcher. In 1981, he moved to Tohoku University as Associate Professor in the Department of Food Chemistry, Faculty of Agriculture. In 1977, he was promoted to Full Professor, Graduate School of Life Science. In 2006, he moved to Yokohama University of Pharmacy as Professor. He worked for Dr. J. J. Fox at Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research (1972-1973) as a Research Associate, and for Dr. J. G. Moffatt at Syntex Research (1973-1974) as a postdoctoral fellow. He worked for The Technical University of Darmstadt as an invited professor by DAAD (1990). He has received several awards including The Agricultural Society of Japan Award for Young Scientists (1974), Inoue Prize for Science (2001), Japan Prize of Agricultural Sciences (2004), The Japan Society for Analytical Chemistry Award (2004), and The Japan Academy Prize (2010).

His research interests cover organic synthesis, chemical biology, and chiral discrimination.

To be Updated

Virus Cell Interaction. The African swine fever virus model

To be updated

Infectious Diseases, Internal Medicine

To be Updated

Microbiological Studies

Dr. Keivan Zandi completed his Ph.D in Medical Virology from Tarbiat Modarres University, Iran. He is currently working as an associate professor in Department of Medical Microbiology, University Malaya. He has published more than 60 research papers in various Scientific Journals and has several patents on his name. He is actively severing as an Editorial Board Member for Scientific Reports with Nature publishing group as well as several other journals such as International Journal of Virology, SM tropical Medicine Journal, International Journal of Pharmacology, American journal of Drug Discovery and development, International Journal of Drug Discovery and Biotechnology journal.

Medical Microbiology

Professor Ludmila Viksna is one of the most experienced experts in Infectology and Hepatology in Latvia. She is Chief Specialist of Infectology in Riga East Clinical University Hospital, Chief Infectologist of Ministry of Health of the Republic of Latvia, Head of the Department of Infectology and Dermatology in Riga Stradins University, Corresponding Member of Latvian Academy of Sciences and President of Association of Infectologists and Hepatologists of Latvia. Professor L.Viksna is the author of 5 books, more than 300 publications and she holds 15 patents.

Hepatitis, Tuberculosis and Borreliosis.

Dr. Edmond Puca has received his PhD in University Hospital Center Mother Teresa during the period of 2010-2014. Currently, he is working as infectologue in University Hospital Center “Mother Teresa”.He is a member of Albanian Society of infectology.He is serving as an editorial member as well as reviewer for several reputed journals.

His research includes sepsis, HFRS and leptospirosis

Associate Professor Angelika Krumina is PhD of Medical Sciences, Leading Researcher in Infectology field in Riga East Clinical University Hospital. A.Krumina is Scientific Expert of Latvian Academy of Sciences, Board Member of Latvian Medical Association and Member of European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. During 2011-2012 she was Project Coordinator in State Programme of Latvian Academy of Sciences. Currently she is Work Package 6 leader in Latvia of Baltinfect project of the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) of the European Commission.

Her major scientific interests are Human herpes viruses HHV- 6 and HHV-7 and Vector - borne infectious diseases.

Sunil Kumar Gupta has completed his PhD at the age of 32 years from King George\'s Medical University, Lucknow, INDIA. He is the Research Scientist of Bioinformatics, a premier Biotech Park, Lucknow India. He has published more than 12 papers in reputed journals and presented more than 15 research findings in National and International conferences.

His Research interest is in the area of infectious diseases specially on Genus Flavivirus.

Dr. Connolly is a Senior Principal Investigator and Director for Translational Immunology at the Institute of Molecular and Cellular Biology (IMCB). Additionally, Dr. Connolly serves as Program Director for the A*Star Program in Translational Research in Infectious Disease (http://www.a-star.edu.sg/aspire), a multi-disciplinary center focused on target discovery and vaccine development. His research interests focus on rational vaccine design. He is an Adjunct Associate Professor of Immunology at Baylor University. Dr. Connolly received his Ph.D. in Immunology from Dartmouth Medical School and studied human dendritic cell biology under Dr. Michael Fanger. During this time he was involved in the development of immunotherapeutic preclinical models and clinical trials for Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). He moved to the Baylor Institute for Immunology Research, a fully translational research institute dedicated to rationally designed vaccines against cancer and infectious disease. Dr. Connolly served as the Director of Research Initiatives for the Baylor Research Institute, leading a large integrated translational research resource and multi-institutional programs that involved a number of international sites. During his tenure at Baylor, Dr. Connolly was the central core facility director of the NIAID Centers for Translational Research on Human Immunology and Biodefense, an NIH funded consortium of basic, translational research and clinical trials focused on vaccine design.

Director for Translational Immunology
Institute of Molecular and Cellular Biology
Director of Research Initiatives
Baylor Research Institute
United States

Prof Tripp received his doctorate in 1989 from Oregon State University in the field of viral immunity. He was awarded a National Research Service Award and studied adenovirus mechanisms of immune evasion under the tutelage of Dr. Linda Gooding at Emory University, and then was a post-doctoral fellow with 1996 Nobel Laureate Professor Peter C. Doherty at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital where he studied the mechanisms of T cell memory to influenza virus. Following these programs, Prof Tripp led a research team in vaccine studies for respiratory viral diseases, as a Section Chief, in the Respiratory and Enteric Viruses Branch at the CDC in Atlanta, GA. Prof Tripp now oversees research activities at the Animal Health Research Center at the Univ Georgia which is BSL2/BSL3 biocontainment facility where his laboratory develops platform enabling technologies in pathogen biosensing using nanotechnology-based approaches, antiviral drugs using small molecule and RNAi-based drugs, and animal and human vaccines using state-of-the-art technologies with an in-house GMP vaccine facility. Prof Tripp is Editor-in-Chief; Journal of Antivirals & Antiretrovirals, Academic Editor of PLoS ONE; on the Board of Editors, Virology, and Associate Editor, Cellular Immunology.

Professor of Infectious Diseases
Associate Director of Center of Molecular Medicine
Associate Director of Biomedical Health Sciences
Adjunct Professor of University of Canberra
Adjunct Professor of University of Liverpool
Tel

Yves Jacob, MD, PhD is group leader in virus-host interactomics in the Molecular Genetics of RNA Viruses Unit in the Department of Virology, Pasteur Institute Paris. He has received a MD from Lariboisière-St Louis School of Medicine, Paris University in 1983 (mentor Prof Jean Dausset, awarded Nobel Prize 1980), and after a three years residency/clinicat in Necker Hospital in Paris, he joined the Pasteur Institute and received a PhD in Philosophy from the Denis Diderot University in 1992. Since 2001, after completing his postdoctoral training in virology, his is senior scientist in the Department of Virology at Pasteur Institute in Paris. The main line of investigation of his team concerns virus/host interactomics with pioneering analyses using high-throughput innovative approaches combining a yeast two-hybrid pipeline with an orthogonal assay performed in human based on complementation of a split-luciferase. Since several years, a close collaboration was also established with the Center for Cancer Systems Biology (CCSB, Harvard Medical School), a center of excellence which has generated first-draft models of the human interactome. By plugging virus interactomics datasets onto these models, the main goal of his team is to answer questions such as how perturbations in complex networks induced by viral hijacking lead to pathogeny. Since 2012, Dr Jacob shared time between Pasteur Institute in Paris and CCSB in Boston.

Group Leader
Department of Virology
Pasteur Institute, Paris
Tel: 331-456-887-53

Assistant Professor
Department of Neurosurgery
University of Pittsburgh
Member of the American Society of Gene Therapy & American Association Cancer Research
Tel: 412-648-9461

Director
Australian Animal Health Laboratory
Australia
Tel: 6135-227-5160

Department of Medicine
Division of Internal Medicine and Infectious Disease Service
San Antonio Military Medical Center
Brooke Army Medical Center
USA

Professor, Department of Medicine<\br> Harvard Medical School<\br> Professor of Medicine, Cancer Immunology/AIDS<\br> Dana-Farber Cancer Institute<\br> USA

Professor and Director of Neuropathology<\br> University of Illinois<\br> USA

Head of Division
Paul-Ehrlich-Institute
Federal Institute for Vaccines and Biomedicines
Germany
Tel:4961-0377-7400

Associate Professor
Department of Medical Microbiology
University of Manitoba, USA
Tel: 204-977-5677

Nuclear import and export of viral and cellular macromolecules.

Nuclear import and export of viral and cellular macromolecules.

Marc H V Van Regenmortel is currently an Emeritus Research Director at the CNRS (French National Research Center) in the School of Biotechnology of the University of Strasbourg, France. He was for 22 years Director of the Immunochemistry Laboratory at the CNRS Molecular Biology Institute in Strasbourg and previously was a professor at several universities in South Africa and France. He served (1984-1990) as Vice Chairman and Chairman of the Virology Division of the International Union of Microbiological Societies (IUMS) and was Secretary General of IUMS from 1990 to 1999. He was also for six years (1996-2002) President of the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses. He supervised the research work of 30 PhD students and has published 395 research and review papers as well as 17 books in the fields of Virology and Immunochemistry. In 2009 he co-edited with Brian Mahy of the CDC in Atlanta, the third edition of the Encyclopedia of Virology in 5 volumes published by Elsevier. He is currently Editor-in-Chief of ARCHIVES OF VIROLOGY and JOURNAL OF MOLECULAR RECOGNITION, an Executive Editor of ANALYTICAL BIOCHEMISTRY, an Associate Editor of ADVANCES IN VIRUS RESEARCH, FRONTIERS IN IMMUNOTHERAPIES AND VACCINES, JOURNAL OF IMMUNOLOGICAL METHODS, ISRN IMMUNOLOGY, BIONOMINA and EXPERT REVIEWS OF PROTEOMICS

General virology, Immunochemistry of viruses, viral diagnostics, synthetic peptide vaccines, HIV vaccines, SPR biosensors, viral taxonomy, philosophy of science

After graduating at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Helsinki, Finland in 1986 I worked for 16 years as a private veterinary surgeon in southern Finland mainly in small animal and mixed practice. Between 2002 and 2004 I completed research-based Master’s degree studies on virology at the Department of Veterinary Tropical Diseases, Faculty of Veterinary Science, University of Pretoria, South Africa on the detection of lumpy skin disease virus (LSDV) in samples of experimentally infected cattle using different diagnostic techniques. In 2004 I was employed by The Pirbright Institute as a research scientist to set up the full diagnostic capacity for capripoxviruses. Since 2006 I have been heading the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) reference laboratory for lumpy skin disease (LSD), sheep pox (SPP) and goat pox (GTP) in Pirbright, UK. In 2007 I was appointed as OIE’s international expert for LSD, SPP and GTP. Since 2006 I have also been responsible of the veterinary care of experimental animals at Pirbright as a Named Veterinary Surgeon. My special interest in the research field for capripoxviruses is the epidemiology, control and eradication of the diseases as well as training and enhancement of diagnostic capacity for capripoxviruses in local and national reference laboratories in developing countries. Since late 2006 I have been investigating the role of hard tick vectors in the transmission of LSDV.

Veterinary expertise on lumpy skin disease, sheeppox and goatpox

University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, USA
University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey

Sharof Tugizov is an Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine, University of California San Francisco. He earned his PhD and BSc degrees from the Institute of Virology, Russian Academy of Medical Science.

Virology, epithelial biology, interaction of viruses with mucosal epithelium.

Teaching within the Faculty of Health Sciences includes the following: Residents in the Medical Microbiology/ Infectious Diseases and Pathology Residency Training Programs, Graduate Course in Clinical Virology (MS763), Graduate students thesis supervision in my laboratory, and Supervisory Committee member for six graduate students in medical Sciences.

The major focus of our research is the pathophysiology of acute respiratory infections caused by specific viruses (influenza, RSV) and bacteria (Chlamydia pneumoniae, P. aeruginosa and C. difficile).

Dr Aboul-Ata Elnady ABOUL-ATA, Professor Dr. of Plantvirology, who was born on Mar.22nd 1948 in Sharkia, Egypt, is the president of ArSV (Arab Society for Virology) in 2013 for 3 years. He was formerly Department Head of Plant Virus and Phytoplasma Research, Plant Pathology Research Institute at Agricultural Research Center, Giza, Egypt for 3 years (2003-2006), and Head of Molecular laboratory at Plant Virus and Phytoplasma Res. from Sep. 2005 up to now.
In 2007 he has been awarded committee membership of Egyptian Society of Advanced Material and Nano Technology. He is being a committee-member of Egyptian Society of Virology since initiation in 2001. He is being member of the Molecular Virology Group at the University of Kentucky, USA, American Phytopathological Society, The New York Academy of Sciences, American Society for Microbiology, Federation of British Plant Pathologists (FBPP) UK, Egyptian Society of Entomology, Egyptian Society of Plant Pathology, Egyptian Society of Applied Microbiology, African Virology Associan (AVA), South Africa, Who\'sWho in the World, Record # World-18, 2001 GNNF 2852757104, USA.
Dr. Aboul-Ata is the author of more than 40 scientific papers in different approaches i.e. gene silencing, sequencing of viral genes. He is being the author of Chapters in different books i.e. Mediterranean Link Committee for Processing Tomato Research (MELCOPTOR) Book and Virus Diseases and Control in Arab World. As new era of research, he is leading an Egyptian research group (human virologists and molecular biologists) for a Swedish-funded project on Plant-based vaccine against HSV-2 in collaboration with Gothenburg University, Sweden throughout 2007-2010. He also leading a MERC project on detection of cereal viruses for prevention through quarantine system in Middle East countries (Egypt, Jordan, Israel and Palestine) throughout 2008-2011, appointed for funding. He is being in charge of nanoscience introduction to the domain of plant virology at Plant Pathology Research Institute. He brings his research a unique relationship study between viruses and insect vectors. He has introduced advanced thinking in virus epidemiology and molecular epidemiology, virus and Antiserum Bank, at the Dept. of Plant Virus and Phytoplasma Res. He is being chosen for general-, scientific- and organizing-committee member for the First and 2nd Conference of Virology, which was organized by ESV at 2004 and 2008, Cairo, Egypt. He has also been chosen to be International Advisory-committee member for the 2nd Green revolution in India that is organized 2-5 July, 2009. He is an evaluation-committee member for promotion to higher scientific position i.e. Assoc. Professorship and Professorship at Institute of Plant Pathology, ARC, Egypt 2008 up to now.
Dr. Aboul-Ata has been chosen for reviewing at International Journal of Virology (IJV), ANSInet, and has been invited for reviewing at Biotechnology and Molecular Biology Reviews (BMBR), Academic Journals. Reviewing starts 2006-2009. He has reviewed more than 35 articles for both journals. He is also editorial board member of Egyptian Journal of Virology (Egyptian J. Virol.) as well as Indian Scientific Journals. He has been reviewing for Journal of Virological Methods. He also has been invited to be an editor for Briefings in functional Genomics and Proteomics, one of Oxford Journals.

President
Arab Society for Virology
Egypt

Hye Kyung Chung received her Ph.D from Kun-kuk University and she studied the pathogenesis and molecular mechanism of retroviruses as a postdoctoral fellow at the National Institutes of Health. She has spent the majority of her research career studying molecular virology, recently pathogenesis of human and animal lentiviruses. She studies NHP models of retroviral latency and reactivation collaborating with Dr. Pincus. Dr. Chung continues to develop cutting-edge new assays to study viral reservoirs.

Molecular virology Recently pathogenesis of human and animal lentiviruses NHP models of retroviral latency viral reservoirs

Dr. Deepak Shukla has received his PhD in Microbiology and Immunology from the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) during the period of 1990-1996. Currently, he is working as the Marion Schenk Esq. Professor of Ocular Virology in the Departments of Ophthalmology &Visual Sciences and Microbiology & Immunology at UIC College of Medicine in Chicago, IL. He is also the Director of Ocular Virology Laboratory at UIC. He serves on the editorial boards of prestigious journals, has been a regular reviewer for over a dozen reputed scientific journals, and has authored over 50 peer-reviewed papers including publications in top rated journals such as Cell, Journal of Clinical Investigation, Journal of Cell Biology, Journal of Biological Chemistry etc. He has also written two book chapters and holds two international patents for his discoveries. He was the lead discoverer of 3-O sulfated heparan sulfate as the host cell membrane receptor for herpes simplex virus. He has received outstanding research awards from many organizations including American Herpes Foundation, Research to Prevent Blindness Inc. an

Dr. Shukla’s main research interest focuses on cell biology of virus entry into human cells. He has identified host cell membrane receptors for viruses such as herpes viruses. He is currently studying how membrane receptors and membrane morphology facilitate viral infections. Apart from heparan sulfate proteoglycans, he also studies HVEM, a member of tumor necrosis factor receptor family and nectin-1, a member of immunoglobulin superfamily.

David Andrew Jans is a leading cell biologist who is widely recognized internationally for his seminal accomplishment in elucidating the process of nucleocytoplasmic transport and signal transduction in health and disease. His research career includes more than 250 refereed scientific papers (16 with over 100 citations, and 3 with over 300; over 9000 citations in all), multiple invitations to present at international conferences (7 plenaries, 2 keynote addresses, and 2 closing remarks speeches in the last 12 years), editorial board memberships of several eminent journals, and a H-index of 54. His meritorious awards include: IRPC (International Research Progress Council) Eminent Scientist of the Year (1999), the Danny Thomas Lecture Series Visiting Professor (St. Jude Childrens Research Hospital, Memphis, 2005), Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Senior Short-term Fellowship (2008), the GE

Nuclear Signalling Laboratory: Nuclear Trafficking in Health and Disease

Principal Research Leader & ARC Future Fellow, Institute for Glycomics.

The core research activities in my laboratory are in-depth investigations of viral diseases, their pathogenesis, treatment and prevention and virus-host interactions, including the role of soluble mediators and cell subsets in virus-induced disease.

Shahzad, currently based in Vienna, Austria, is one of the pioneers, working for the progress of Translational Medicine (TM) field. Prof. Shahzad is currently serving as Director of Administration and Secretary General for “International Society for Translational Medicine (ISTM)”. He is also acting as a chair for Translational Medicine SIAC group at ‘Dug Information Association’ (DIA). Prof. Shahzad is serving as editor-in-chief for ‘Molecular Medicine & Therapeutics (MMT) Journal and for ‘Translational Biomedicine’ Journal. Prof. Shahzad has advised and participated in establishing Translational Medicine infrastructure for several organizations. Dr. Shahzad is invited speaker for many international life sciences conferences. He is professor of Microbiology and Professor of Medicine, at Harbin Medical University. In addition, various organizations are getting benefited from wide expertise of Prof. Shahzad in his capacity as a medical advisor and medical scientific expert.BIOGRAPHY

Translational Research and Clinical Diagnostics

Shih-Shun Lin has completed his Ph.D at 2001 from National Chung-Hsing University and postdoctoral studies from The Rockefeller University. Currently, he is the assistant professor of Institute of Biotechnology, National Taiwan University. He has published more than 21 papers in reputed journals in plant virology and plant molecular biology fields. He also is a adjunct research fellow in Genome Biology and Systems Biology Degree Program, NTU, and Agricultural Biotechnology Research Center, Academia Sinica (Taiwan).

The expertises of Dr. Lin are plant molecular biology and virology, biotechnology, and high-throughput next generation sequence technology.