Dr. Miller received his Ph.D. in 1979 from the University of Texas, did a postdoc in dopamine electrophysiology at UT Southwestern until 1982, followed by a second postdoc in circadian neurobiology at UC Riverside and UC Davis until 1987. From 1982-1987 he also served as a NASA space shuttle project director. Dr. Miller was a research associate in the Stanford Biology Department from 1987-1994 and the Director of Neurochemistry in the Stanford-Upjohn Center for the Study of Sleep and Circadian Rhythms. He was a faculty member in the Department of Pharmacology, Texas Tech Health Sciences Center from 1994 until 2000.From 2000 to 2013 he was an associate professor in the Department of Cell and Neurobiology at the Keck School of Medicine at USC. In March 2013 he accepted a position as Chair of Pharmacology at the American University of the Caribbean School of Medicine where he continues to work.

Suowen Xu, Ph.D., is a natural product pharmacologist. Dr. Xu received his Ph.D. did postdoc studies in biochemistry at NHLBI/NIH, followed by a second postdoc in vascular biology at University of Rochester. Currently, Dr. Xu is Research Assistant Professor of Medicine at University of Rochester. He is a principal investigator interested in identifying novel therapeutic targets and molecular interventions of cardiovascular diseases. He was also an adjunct faculty member (Associate Professor) in the School of Pharmacy, The University of Queensland. He is an editorial board member of 4 journals and serves as reviewers for over 50 journals.

Nelson S. Yee, M.D., Ph.D., F.A.C.P. R.Ph. is the Team Leader of Gastrointestinal Oncology at Penn State Cancer Institute. Dr. Yee received undergraduate education at Massachusetts College of Pharmacy. He then pursued medical education and graduate research training at Cornell University Medical College and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. At Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, he underwent clinical training in Internal Medicine, Hematology, and Medical Oncology. Currently, Dr. Yee is Associate Professor of Medicine at Pennsylvania State University. He is the principal investigator of clinical studies for new treatment as well as cancer biomarkers and targets in cancer of digestive organs.

Prof. Dr. Esra Küpeli Akkol was born in Turkey. She got her Bachelor of Science degree in Faculty of Pharmacy, Gazi University, Turkey and got her Ph.D. degree in Pharmacognosy Department from the University of Gazi. She is currently Professor in the Gazi University, Faculty of Pharmacy, Department of Pharmacognosy. Sheserved in manycapacities in her fieldincluding service on several editorial boards and numerous review committees for journal ssuch as Journal of Ethnopharmacology, Journal of Pharmacy Sciences, The Internet Journal of HerbalandPlantMedicine, International Journal of GenuineTraditionalMedicine, Advances in Pharmacological Sciences, Evidence Based Complementary Alternative Medicine and The Open Pain Journal. She has conducted 41 projects and 11 thesis in Gazi University. She has 158 published articles in SCI International Journals, 13 articles in National Journals and 10 chapters in International books.

Dr. Allen is a Professor at the Oregon Institute of Occupational Health Sciences and the Department of Behavioral Neuroscience at the Oregon Health & Science University. He received his Ph.D. in Pharmacology from University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. He has authored more than 75 manuscripts and six reviews. The research in his lab focuses on understanding how neurons in the hypothalamic suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) the master circadian oscillator generate circadian timing signals and entrain to the environmental light-dark cycle. We use single-cell electrophysiological recordings, long-term measurements of behavior, and long-term live cell imaging methods to study the signaling pathways in the neural network of SCN neurons and how those contribute to the synchronization of individual SCN oscillators.

Dr. Blanton obtained a doctorate (Ph.D.) in Biology/Biochemistry from the University of California, Santa Cruz, followed by postdoctoral training at Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO and at Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA. Currently Dr. Blanton is a Professor and Vice-Chair in the Department of Pharmacology and Neuroscience at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, Lubbock, TX. Dr. Blanton is also a Senior Associate Dean in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences and director of the MD/PhD Program and the Center for Membrane Protein Research. Dr. Blanton’s research focus is on the structure/function of ligand-gated ion channels, in particular neuronal nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs).

Dr. Tracey Bradshaw joined the Experimental Cancer Chemotherapy group within the Cancer Research Laboratories, University of Nottingham in 1993. Now an assistant professor within the School of Pharmacy, her specific research interests lie in the discovery and development of novel anticancer therapeutics embracing NCEs, natural products, nano-medicines and gelators. Research activities within the field of cancer pharmacology include determination of anticancer activity and elucidation of molecular targets and mechanisms of action of novel preclinical antitumour agents. Such research led to clinical evaluation of Phortress and >90 publications. She is a member of the Drug Discovery Group, PAMM, EORTC and EACR.

Dr. Buolamwini obtained a doctorate (Ph.D.) in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Alberta, Canada. Currently Dr. Buolamwini a Professor in the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, College of Pharmacy, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science. He has published more than 70 scientific publications, edited two books, and is a named inventor of 4 issued U.S patents. Dr. Buolamwini was the founding Editor-in-Chief (2001-2013) of Current Cancer Drug Targets, published by Bentham Science Publishers.

Félix Carvalho, PharmD, PhD, is Full Professor of Toxicology, at the Department of Biological Sciences, Laboratory of Toxicology, Faculty of Pharmacy at University of Porto (FFUP), and researcher of the Research Unit on Applied Molecular Biosciences (UCIBIO), Portugal. He is presently the Vice-President of the Portuguese Society of Pharmacology, Vice-director of UCIBIO and Secretary-General of EUROTOX. During the past 27 years, Félix Carvalho has published over 315 scientific articles / book chapters and is co-editor of two Books in the area of Toxicology.

Dr. Chow currently is a Professor and Vice Chair in the Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology, UCLA School of Medicine. Dr. Chow¹s research is on the molecular mechanism of retroviral DNA integration, a process essential for reproduction of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and other retroviruses. Dr. Chow has developed simple in vitro assays for understanding the mechanism of the integration process and screening for new anti-retroviral drugs. Dr. Chow¹s laboratory is also interested in determining the functional role of HIV integrase during reverse transcription and particle assembly, as well as improving retrovirus-based vectors as a vehicle for gene delivery in mammalian cells.

Dr. Civelli is Professor and Chair of the Department of Pharmacology at University of California, Irvine. He holds the Eric L and Lila D Nelson Chair of Neuropharmacology. Previously he was vice president at F. Hoffmann-La Roche, Basel. He is a recognized leader in the field of neuropsychopharmacology. He was the first to clone the D2 dopamine receptor and discovered the diversity of the dopamine receptors, in particular the D4 receptor. He spearheaded reverse pharmacology and used it to discover the first new neuropeptide identified by this approach, nociceptin/orphanin FQ and later neuropeptide S. He discovered the receptors for melanin concentrating hormone and for urotensin II. His primary interest is the study of neuropsychiatric disorders, in particular schizophrenia. He has authored more than 200 manuscripts and holds 30 patents.

Ricardo Jorge Dinis-Oliveira completed a PhD degree in Toxicology in the University of Porto. By Rector Dispatch awarded the European PhD. He holds 2 Post-Doc in Pharmacology and Toxicology and Habilitation (Aggregation) in Forensic Sciences by the Faculty of Medicine, University of Porto. He published more than 90 papers, 20 book chapters, edited three books and 4 patents. He is Director of the Course in Forensic Laboratorial Sciences, Course in Biomedical Sciences and of the Master in Forensic Sciences and Laboratory Techniques of University Institute of Health Sciences. He is the president elect of the Portuguese Association of Forensic Sciences.

Scott T. Eblen, PhD, earned a BS in Biology from the University of Kentucky and a PhD from Vanderbilt University, performing his dissertation research both at Vanderbilt and the Mayo Clinic. He did postdoctoral work at the University of Virginia in the area of signal transduction by protein kinases. He is currently an Associate Professor of Cell and Molecular Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, SC. His lab studies signal transduction by protein kinases, E3 ubiquitin ligases, and mRNA splicing in the context of cancer and molecular mechanisms of drug resistance.

Dr Elion obtained a doctorate (Ph.D,) in Biochemistry from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University snd is a Professor in the Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology at Harvard Medical School of Harvard University.

Dr. Dwight German received his Ph.D. training in neuroscience at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center and went on to do post-doctoral work in the Department of Physiology & Biophysics and the Regional Primate Research Center at the University of Washington. He is currently a Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. His research focuses on neurodegenerative and neurodevelopmental disorders using both post-mortem human tissues and animal models. His research also focuses on developing blood biomarkers for neurodegenerative/neurodevelopmental disorders.

The research in my laboratory for the past 30 years has been directed towards the areas of experimental chemotherapy and radiotherapy in cancer, with a primary focus on breast cancer and lung cancer. Work has been largely focused on sensitization of lung cancer and breast cancer to radiotherapy and chemotherapy. These efforts have also served to define autophagy and senescence (rather than apoptosis) as primary responses to both chemotherapy and radiotherapy in solid tumor cell models. We have established the existence of cytostatic and cytotoxic functions of autophagy in lung cancer cells and breast cancer cells while recent work has also identified a non-protective form of autophagy that is critical to understanding why efforts towards chemosensitization and radiosensitization via autophagy inhibition may prove to be particularly challenging in the absence of appropriate predictive biomarkers. Current work is focused on approaches for establishing the reversibility of senescence both in cell culture and tumor bearing animal models, with the longer term goal of understanding the role of senescence in sensitivity (or refractoriness) to therapy in breast and lung cancer.

Dr. Wael M Abdel-Rahman (Hassan); MBBCH, MSc (Pathology), PhD (Molecular Pathology) is the coordinator of the MSc/PhD program in Molecular Medicine, College of Medicine and Associate Professor at the College of Health Sciences, University of Sharjah. He is one of the inaugurating researchers of the Sharjah Institute of Medical Research. He is the chair of the College Research Committee and ex-member of the University Postgraduate Studies Council. He is a board member of many scientific journals and conferences and acted as a referee in many awards and grants.

Chaunshu Huang is a Professor of Department of Environmental Medicine and Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology and Urology, and Deputy Director of Nelson Institute of Environmental medicine, New York University School of Medicine. Dr. Huang published more than 280 research papers with total citation over 11,200. Chuanshu’s major research addresses fundamental questions concerning the responses of mammalian cells to environmental carcinogens at the levels of protein kinases, transcription factors and their target genes, as well as protein modification both in vitro and in vivo. His research also includes elucidation of tumor invasion and metastasis, as well as screening and identifying novel anti-cancer drugs and the molecular mechanisms underlying their anti-cancer effect.

Peng Huang, M.D., Ph.D., is a professor at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas. He received his medical degree at Sun Yat-sen University School of Medicine and his PhD degree from the University of Texas Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences at Houston. Dr. Huang’s research interests are in the areas of cancer metabolism, ROS/redox biology, and anticancer agents. In particular, his laboratory investigates the mechanistic links between oncogentic signals, mitochondrial alterations, and changes in cellular metabolism and drug sensitivity. He has over 160 publications including high-impact articles that are frequently cited. Prof. Huang is currently Associate Editor of Molecular Cancer and a member of editorial boards of multiple scientific journals.

Dr. Kelley is the Betty and Earl Herr Chair in Pediatric Oncology Research and Professor, Departments of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology and Pharmacology & Toxicology, Director, Program in Pediatric Molecular Oncology & Experimental Therapeutics, Indiana University School of Medicine. He is also the Associate Director, Herman B Wells Center and the Associate Director for Basic Science at the IU Simon Cancer Center. Dr. Kelley has a PhD from LSU and postdoctorate at The Rockefeller University. He has published over 170 peer-reviewed articles, 30 reviews/book chapters and has 11 patents. He also edited both editions in DNA Repair in Cancer Therapy: Molecular Targets and Clinical Applications.

Michael Kuhar has more than 40 years experience studying drugs and the brain. He has over 400 research publications, a number of patents and books, and has received many awards and prizes for his work. He has trained more than 60 younger scientists who have important positions around the world in academia, government and industry. Over his career, he has been Professor at Johns Hopkins, at the National Institutes of Health, and is currently at Emory. His website is at: http://www.michaeljkuhar.com/

Sichuan University, China (BS, 1990), Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences (MS, 1993; Ph.D. 1996), NIH (Post Doct. 1997-2000), Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences (full professor, 2001-2017). From April 2017, Dr. Long joined Soochow University Medical College in Suzhou, China as the distinguished professor and vice dean. She has published more than more than 90 scientific publications and is a named inventor of 20 issued Chinese patents and 2 U.S patents. Research Interests: (1) Medicinal chemical biology, and (2) Design, synthesis and structure-function relationship study of antivirals and antitumor agents, and (3) green chemistry construction of privileged structure and natural product fragment-based focused library.

Dr. Maksay received his Ph.D. in 1976 from Eötvös University of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary. His previous affiliations: Department of Molecular Pharmacology, Institute of Biomolecular Chemistry, Chemical Research Centre (1973-2011, from postdoc up to head of department); Research Group of Functional Pharmacology, Institute of Molecular Pharmacology and Institute of Organic Chemistry, Research Centre for Natural Sciences (senior research adviser, 2011-2015). He has retired as a research professor emeritus of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Research interests: receptorology; structure-activity relationships; ionotropic neurotransmitter receptors (GABAA, glycine, 5-HT3); allosteric modulation; recombinant receptors and voltage-clamp electrophysiology; receptor modeling; structural biology and symmetry violations of signalling complexes. He is Editorial Board member of the journal of the Hungarian Biochemical Society and of the World Journal of Pharmacology.

John L. Nitiss PhD is a professor of Pharmacology and Assistant Dean for Research at the University of Illinois College of Pharmacy. Prior to joining the University of Illinois in 2011, Dr. Nitiss was in the Molecular Pharmacology Department at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital (1994-2011) and the Department of Pediatrics and Biochemistry at the University of Southern California (1989-1994). He received his PhD in 1986 from the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1986, and carried out postdoctoral work under the direction of James Wang at Harvard University (1987-1989). His laboratory studies DNA topoisomerases as targets of anti-cancer drugs and mechanisms of DNA repair.

Dr. Steven Christopher O’Reilly, Ph.D., is currently a Senior Lecturer of Immunology, in the Faculty of Health and Life Sciences, at Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. His skills and expertise mainly lie in the subject areas of Rheumatology, Immunology, Clinical Immunology, Internal Medicine (General Medicine), Neurology, Diabetology, Pediatrics, etc. Dr. O’Reilly has been awarded funding from Rosetrees Trust (August 2016-2017), JGW Patterson Foundation (September 2016-2017) and North East Skin Research Fund (2018) for different researches.

Prof. Pedro F. Oliveira was conferred his Biochemistry degree in 1996 at University of Porto. In 2004 he was conferred a PhD degree in Biomedical Sciences at the Institute for Biomedical Sciences Abel Salazar (ICBAS), University of Porto, where he did a Post-Doctorate on Reproductive Biology. Presently, he is a Principal Researcher at i3S – Instituto de Investigação e Inovação em Saúde and a Professor at ICBAS, University of Porto. His main research interests are Biology of Reproduction, Urology, Andrology and Biochemistry, with a particular emphasis on the metabolic modulation of spermatogenesis. His contribution to these research fields has been recognized with the attainment of several research grants and with the invitation to publish in a number of leading journals.

Dr. Pelicano obtained a doctorate (Ph.D.) in Chemistry and biochemistry from the University of Montpellier II, France. Currently Dr. Pelicano is an instructor at MD Anderson cancer center in Houston. Dr. Pelicano’s research focuses on cancer metabolism, oxidative stress, anticancer agents, and novel therapeutic strategies. Dr. Pelicano has published more than 40 peer-reviewed research articles.

Dr. Plasencia obtained a doctorate (Ph.D.) in Medicine and surgery from the University Autonoma of Barcelona (Barcelona, Spain). Dr. Plasencia also holds an Executive Masters in Biotechnology from Genoma España and is currently finalizing the Executive Master in Business Administration from EAE business school (Barcelona). Currently Dr. Plasencia is co-founder and chief executive officer of the small biotech Applied Research using Omic Sciences (Aromics S.L.) and co-founder and chairman of the board of Aesis Therapeutics (Italy) and Acceleromics (Spain). All three biopharmaceutical companies are devoted to the development of novel antitumor and antiviral agents. She has scientific publications in international journals and currently acts as European expert for European Commision R&D programs.

Dr Philippe Pourquier obtained a doctorate (Ph.D.) in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Bordeaux, France. Dr Pourquier also holds a Pharmacy Doctorate from the same University. Dr Pourquier is currently a Research Director at the french National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM) in the research unit U1194 in Montpellier, France. Dr Pourquier acquired a solid experience in the field of drug resistance to anticancer agents, in particular DNA topoisomerases’ inhibitors and has published more than 60 papers in this field. He is developing basic and translational research programs to identify alternative therapies for the treatment of castration-resistant prostate cancers.

My research interest was focused on new therapeutics strategies in cancer treatment. I studied Biochemistry at University of Basque Country (1992 – 1997) and obtained my PhD (1998 - 2002) in the Spanish National Research Council (IIB-CSIC). I was a junior scientist at the Department of R&D at Pharmamar Inc. (2003 - 2004), and at University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) (2005-2008). In 2009, I joined to DKFZ (German Cancer Research Center) in the division “Systems Biology of Signal Transduction”, as a project manager for LungSys consortium (2009-2015). Currently I am employed by German Center for Lung Research (DZL), in the multidisciplinary group of Lung Carcinoma.

My studies focus on clustering of molecular partners in defined subcellular compartments (signalosomes) that enable cells to exert highly specialized tasks. Current studies on the organization of signaling components within functional units and how novel pathways regulate physiological processes in cell, tissue and organ systems engage research areas of integrative pharmacology and translational medicine within a multidisciplinary approach with local, national and international collaborators. We apply for example precision cut tissue slice organ-on-a-chip techniques. I very much enjoy collaborations and the opportunity to work with others and to excite young people about research.

Arne Schousboe obtained his M.Sc. in biochemistry from The University of Copenhagen in 1968 at a time where an M. Sc. was considered equivalent to a Ph.D. He subsequently (1978) earned his Doctor of Science (D. Sc.) degree also from University of Copenhagen. In 1990 he moved to the Royal Danish School of Pharmacy, Copenhagen as a Full Professor of biochemistry. He has served as the Department Chair from 2005 to 2010 and is now part time Professor of Neuropharmacology in Department of Drug Design and Pharmacology at University of Copenhagen. He has published over 550 papers on these and related topics.

Dr. Stern received her undergraduate training in Biology from School of Sciences, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Her study focus in University of Buenos Aires was on molecular and evolutionary genetics. She later obtained her PhD in Cancer Biology at the University of Texas-MD Anderson Cancer Center and pursued postdoctoral training in molecular epidemiology from the National Institutes of Environmental Health Sciences, National Institutes of Health. At USC, she is currently a Professor in the departments of Preventive Medicine and Urology in the Keck School of Medicine. Dr. Stern overall research interests are in the following main areas: diet and cancer, clinical epidemiology of prostate cancer, and cancer health disparities in Latino populations.

Professor Akira Sugawara belongs to the Department of Molecular Endocrinology, Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine, Sendai, Japan. He graduated from Tohoku University School of Medicine on 1987 (M.D.), and got Ph.D. on 1991 from Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine. He performed Postdoctoral Fellowship in William Chin’s laboratory at the Women’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School in Boston from 1991 to 1994. His major is general internal medicine, endocrinology and metabolism and hypertension and nephrology. His research interest is 1) molecular biology of nuclear hormone receptors, 2) etiology of high blood pressure, 3) pathophysiology of diabetic nephropathy, 4) gene regulation of aldosterone synthase, and 5) epigenetics of hypertension and diabetes mellitus.

Derek S. Tan received his BS in Chemistry from Stanford in 1995, with Prof. Dale G. Drueckhammer, and his PhD in Chemistry from Harvard in 2000, with Prof. Stuart L. Schreiber. After postdoctoral training with Prof. Samuel J. Danishefsky at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, he began his independent career at MSK in 2002. He is currently a tenured Member and Chairman of the Chemical Biology Program at MSK, a Tri-Institutional Professor at Rockefeller University and Weill Cornell Medicine, and Director of the Tri-Institutional PhD Program in Chemical Biology. His research focuses on diversity-oriented synthesis and rational drug design.

Dr. DaLiao Xiao obtained a Ph.D. degree in Pharmacology from Loma Linda University School of Medicine, California. Dr. Xiao is an associate professor in the Center for Perinatal Biology, Loma Linda University, California, USA. Dr. Xiao’s research is mainly focusing on the fetal programming of cardiovascular system in response to in utero adverse environmental exposure. He and His research group try to understanding of the epigenetic mechanism and identify the epigenetic biomarkers during early life that have diagnostic value to predict the consequences of in utero adverse environmental exposure induced cardiovascular disease in adulthood. He has published more than 70 peer-reviewed scientific publications. His research projects are constantly supported by NIH and California State grants.

Dr. Andrey A. Zamyatnin Jr. is currently a Professor, Head of the Institute of Molecular Medicine in Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, Moscow Russia. He earned his PhD in Virology and later DSc in Virology and Molecular Biology in Lomonosov Moscow State University. His current research interests are molecular markers, molecular targets, development of immunotherapy and enzymatic therapy approaches. Additionally his research interests include programmed cell death, RNAi, virus-host interactions. His scientific publications include more than 50 articles in peer-reviewed journals. Dr. Zamyatnin acts as an Expert in several scientific funds.

Dr. Naiming Zhou received his doctoral degree in molecular biology from Zhejiang Agricultural University in 1993. His postdoctoral work was done at KU Leuven, Belgium, and at Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, respectively. In 2002, he joined Incyte Corporation, Delaware, where he was involved in drug discovery projects. Afterward, he returned to the Zhejiang University where he has been appointed Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in 2006. Dr. Zhou has published more than 60 peer reviewed SCI papers and awarded 5 patents.

Dr. Naiming Zhou received his doctoral degree in molecular biology from Zhejiang Agricultural University in 1993. His postdoctoral work was done at KU Leuven, Belgium, and at Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, respectively. In 2002, he joined Incyte Corporation, Delaware, where he was involved in drug discovery projects. Afterward, he returned to the Zhejiang University where he has been appointed Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in 2006. Dr. Zhou has published more than 60 peer reviewed SCI papers and awarded 5 patents.