Glycobiology & Glycochemistry

Myron R Szewczuk has completed his PhD in 1974 from University of Windsor in Biology and Immunochemistry and Postdoctoral studies from Cornell University Medical College, New York City, USA in Cellular Immunology with Dr Greg Siskind (1975-1978). He is presently a Full Professor of Immunology and Associate Professor of Medicine, Queen’s University, Canada. He has published more than 100 papers in reputed journals and has been serving as an editorial Board Member of repute.

His research interest includes the alternate therapeutic treatment of cancer and the role of glycosylation in the activation of neurotrophin Trk, EGFR, insulin and TOLL-like receptors.

Professor Yuriy Knirel has completed his PhD at the age of 26 years, and 15 years later received ScD degree from the Zelinsky Institute of Organic Chemistry, Russian Academy of Sciences. Since 2005, he is the head of the Laboratory of Carbohydrate Chemistry in the Zelinsky Institute. Yuriy Knirel represents Russia in the International and European Carbohydrate Organisations; in 2015-2017, he was the president of the ECO. Yuriy Knirel has published more than 700 papers in peer-reviewed journals and has been serving as an editor of Carbohydrate Research and an editorial board member of a number of scientific journals.

Reserach interests of Dr. Y.A. Knirel include studies of the lipopolysaccharides of medically important Gram-negative bacteria, including Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Aeromonas hydrophila etc.

Professor:Pathology & Immunology Baylor College of Medicine Houston, TX, US Director of Operations:Center for Drug Discovery Co-Director:Immunology Graduate Program

Dr. Sifers helped pioneer the initial mechanistic analysis of the biological systems that manage glycoprotein homeostasis (i.e., glycoproteostasis) in the mammalian secretory pathway. Using alpha1-antitrypsin deficiency as a medically relevant paradigm and client, his lab characterized the processes of chaperone-assisted glycoprotein folding as a means of conformation-based intracellular retention, and proposed and characterized the mannose timer hypothesis as an initial step in N-glycan-targeted proteolysis (quality control). Subsequently, his team identified the underlying contribution of the unfolded protein response (UPR), and elucidated how compromised quality control can function as an etiologic agent of infantile liver cirrhosis.

During my thesis work in Dr. Celia Schiffer's laboratory, I was tasked with defining and understanding the role of mutations outside of the active site of the HIV-1 protease as it pertains to drug resistance. Briefly, mutations outside of the active site were generally accepted as having compensatory roles to restore enzyme fitness but through my thesis work I was able to determine their direct roles in drug resistance and also pinpoint which mutations underlie changes in various biochemical properties that are essential to drug binding. I also worked very closely with the laboratory of Dr. Ronald Swanstrom over the duration of this project for use of variants they acquired during viral passaging studies. I am still very interested in developing computational techniques to aid in the study of infectious diseases.

Structural Biology, Computational Biology, Bioinformatics

Prof. José Kovensky has PhD from the Universidad de Buenos Aires (Argentina, 1992). He did his postdoctoral research at the Ecole Normale Supérieure (Paris, France, 1994-1995). After being Professor of Organic Chemistry in Argentina, he got a Full Professor position in Amiens in 2002. He has been principal investigator of several projects financed by the Regional Council or Picardie Region, binational projects France-Germany, France-Argentine, and partner in European Projects. He has directed or co-directed 12 PhD theses. He is co-author of more than 80 publications (articles, book chapters, patents).

He has a wide experience in the synthesis and modification of oligosaccharides, in particular uronic acid containing oligosaccharides, sulfonated oligosaccharides, glycosaminoglycans, multivalent glycoclusters, and sugar-based surfactants.

Jun-ichi Kadokawa received his Ph.D. in 1992. He then joined Yamagata University as a Research Associate. From 1996 to 1997, he worked as a visiting scientist at the Max-Planck-Institute for Polymer Research in Germany. In 1999, he became an Associate Professor at Yamagata University and moved to Tohoku University in 2002. He was appointed as a Professor of Kagoshima University in 2004. His research interests focus on polysaccharide materials. He received the Award for Encouragement of Research in Polymer Science (1997) and the Cellulose Society of Japan Award (2009). He has published more than 200 papers in academic journals.

Chemistry of Polysaccharides, Polymer Synthesis

Dr. Wu obtained his Ph.D degree with W. Pigman, who is one of the pioneers in glycoproteins, at New York Medical College; and had his postdoctoral training at E.A. Kabat’s Lab for quantitative immunochemistry, Columbia University Medical Center, New York. He joined as a faculty position at Texas A&M University in 1982; promoted as a full professor at Chang-Gung University since 1989; and as Emeritus Professor in 2011. Dr, Wu published over 120 glycoprotein and polyvalent glycotopes related papers. He is the chief editor for three volumes of Molecular Immunology of COMPLEX Carbohydrates 1 to 3 in Adv. Exp. Med. Biol. 228, 451, 705 (Springer Publisher). His major interests are (i) Glycan purification and characterization; (ii) recognition factors of glycans; (iii) combining sites of lectins and antibodies. He received many Outstanding Research Awards from government agents in Taiwan and U.S.A.

His major interests are (i) Glycan purification and characterization; (ii) recognition factors of glycans; (iii) combining sites of lectins and antibodies.

Robin Polt developed methods for the synthesis of amino acids in Prof. Martin O’Donnell’s lab at IUPUI. He was then trained in the art of Organic Synthesis in the laboratories of Professors Gilbert J. Stork at Columbia University in New York and Dieter Seebach at the ETH in Zürich. He has continued the development of useful synthetic methods for amino acids, amino alcohols, glycosides and glycopeptides. Polt has mentored undergraduates, Ph.D. students from the USA, Czech Republic, China, India, Iran, Ireland, Kenya, Korea, Mexico and Sri Lanka, as well as post-doctoral students who have taken positions in academia, industry and government.

Amino Acid Synthesis

Dr. Menter received his PhD degree in Chemistry from the George Washington University in 1969. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship with Prof. Dr. Theodor Foerster at the Institut fuer physikalische Chemie der Universtaet Stuttgart, Germany. Subsequently, he was at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, and the VA Medical Center (Atlanta) He currently serves as Research Professor of Biochemistry at Morehouse School of Medicine. Dr. Menter is recognized internationally for his work in the areas of collagen photochemistry and melanin photobiology as pertaining to redox reactivity

Collagen photochemistry and melanin photobiology

Thomas Kieber-Emmons, PhD. Professor of Pathology, is Co-Leader of the Therapeutic Sciences Program at the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute and holds the Josetta Wilkins Endowed Chair in Breast Cancer Research. He obtained his PhD in Biophysics and Molecular Immunology at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute applying structural immunology design principles to develop antibody based immunogens. He is known for his work on developing carbohydrate mimetic peptides (CMPs) as vaccines in both the cancer and pathogen areas and is an acknowledged pioneer in this field. His work reflects one of the very true bench-to-bedside initiatives as a CMP immunogen is in several Phase 2 clinical trials.

Breast Cancer Research and Pathology.

Thomas Kieber-Emmons, PhD. Professor of Pathology, is Co-Leader of the Therapeutic Sciences Program at the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute and holds the Josetta Wilkins Endowed Chair in Breast Cancer Research. He obtained his PhD in Biophysics and Molecular Immunology at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute applying structural immunology design principles to develop antibody based immunogens. He is known for his work on developing carbohydrate mimetic peptides (CMPs) as vaccines in both the cancer and pathogen areas and is an acknowledged pioneer in this field. His work reflects one of the very true bench-to-bedside initiatives as a CMP immunogen is in several Phase 2 clinical trials.

Breast Cancer Research and Pathology.

Thomas Kieber-Emmons, PhD. Professor of Pathology, is Co-Leader of the Therapeutic Sciences Program at the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute and holds the Josetta Wilkins Endowed Chair in Breast Cancer Research. He obtained his PhD in Biophysics and Molecular Immunology at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute applying structural immunology design principles to develop antibody based immunogens. He is known for his work on developing carbohydrate mimetic peptides (CMPs) as vaccines in both the cancer and pathogen areas and is an acknowledged pioneer in this field. His work reflects one of the very true bench-to-bedside initiatives as a CMP immunogen is in several Phase 2 clinical trials.

Breast Cancer Research and Pathology.

Thomas Kieber-Emmons, PhD. Professor of Pathology, is Co-Leader of the Therapeutic Sciences Program at the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute and holds the Josetta Wilkins Endowed Chair in Breast Cancer Research. He obtained his PhD in Biophysics and Molecular Immunology at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute applying structural immunology design principles to develop antibody based immunogens. He is known for his work on developing carbohydrate mimetic peptides (CMPs) as vaccines in both the cancer and pathogen areas and is an acknowledged pioneer in this field. His work reflects one of the very true bench-to-bedside initiatives as a CMP immunogen is in several Phase 2 clinical trials.

Breast Cancer Research and Pathology.

Maria Longas completed her PhD at New York University in 1978, and did her postdoctoral training at Columbia University School of Medicine with Dr. Karl Mayer. She has an MA in Organic Chemistry from New York University (1973) and a BA in Chemistry from Hunter College (1971). She is a full Professor of Chemistry at Purdue University Calumet in Hammond, IN. She has more than 24 papers published in reputable journals, and served as a reviewer for several journals.

Research interest includes arthritis, tuberculosis and autoimmune disorders.

Iva Turyan has her expertise in characterization of N- and O-glycosylation and monosaccharide analysis at the level of released glycans and intact therapeutic recombinant protein. She completed her PhD from St. Petersburg University and postdoctoral studies at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She is currently an Analytical Development Scientist at Biogen, Cambridge, MA. She has publishes more than 45 papers in reputed journals, and has been awarded 6 patents.

Glycosylation and Glycoproteins

Professor Alexander A. Kamnev, DSc in physical chemistry, is a Leading Scientist at the Institute of Biochemistry and Physiology of Plants and Microorganisms, Russian Academy of Sciences (Saratov, Russia). Professor Kamnev has published over 120 papers in peer-refereed international journals, has been regularly involved as an organiser of, and as an invited/plenary lecturer at a number of international conferences and in refereeing manuscripts for many scientific journals published by Elsevier, Springer, Wiley, RSC, ACS, etc. He is a member of Editorial Boards of several specialised scientific journals including Spectrochimica Acta Part A (“Elsevier”) and Current Enzyme Inhibition (“Bentham Science Publishers”).

His current research has been focused on the application of spectroscopic techniques in studying biomolecules (including biopolymers), biocomplexes, supramolecular structures and microbial cells; spectroscopic detection of biospecific interactions using functionalised plasmonic nanoparticles; bioanalytical applications of vibrational (FTIR, Raman) and Mössbauer (nuclear gamma-resonance) spectroscopies.

Neil Price has a Ph.D. from the University of London, and has postdoctoral experience at the Univ. of Geneva in Switzerland, Paul-Sabatier University in Toulouse, and the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center in Athens, GA. He held a faculty position the U. of Rochester, NY before moving to the NCAUR, Peoria.

His research includes carbohydrate chemistry and biochemistry, mass spectrometry, and microbial metabolism. He currently serves on the ARS National Chemical Patent committee, and has over 90 peer-reviewed research publications.

Dr. Menter received his Ph.D. degree in Chemistry from the George Washington University in 1969. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship with Prof. Dr. Theodor Foerster at the Institut fuer physikalische Chemie der Universtiaet Stuttgart, Germany. Subsequently, he was at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, and the VA Medical Center (Atlanta) He currently serves as Research Professor of Biochemistry at Morehouse School of Medicine. Dr. Menter is recognized internationally for his work in the areas of collagen photochemistry and melanin photobiology as pertaining to redox reactivity.

His research interest includes in the areas of collagen photochemistry and melanin photobiology as pertaining to redox reactivity.

Maria Longas completed her PhD at New York University in 1978, and did her postdoctoral training at Columbia University School of Medicine with Dr. Karl Mayer. She has an MA in Organic Chemistry from New York University (1973) and a BA in Chemistry from Hunter College (1971). She is a full Professor of Chemistry at Purdue University Calumet in Hammond, IN. She has more than 24 papers published in reputable journals, and served as a reviewer for several journals.

Her research interest includes arthritis, tuberculosis and autoimmune disorders.

Myron R Szewczuk has completed his PhD in 1974 from University of Windsor in Biology and Immunochemistry and Postdoctoral studies from Cornell University Medical College, New York City, USA in Cellular Immunology with Dr Greg Siskind (1975-1978). He is presently a Full Professor of Immunology and Associate Professor of Medicine, Queen’s University, Canada. He has published more than 100 papers in reputed journals and has been serving as an editorial Board Member of repute.

His research interest includes the alternate therapeutic treatment of cancer and the role of glycosylation in the activation of neurotrophin Trk, EGFR, insulin and TOLL-like receptors.

Professor Marzabadi completed her PhD at the University of Missouri – St. Louis and carried out postdoctoral studies at Hunter College- CUNY. She has been at Seton Hall University for the past 15 years and has been a Visiting Professor at Harvard University Medical School and a Visiting Researcher at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. She has published numerous papers in the carbohydrate literature and currently serves as a Member at Large for the ACS Division of Carbohydrate Chemistry.

Her research interest includes the synthesis and biological evaluation of new carbohydrate structures with the capacity to act as immunomodulators.

Dr. Desai is the Director of Institute for Structural Biology, Drug Discovery and Development at Virginia Commonwealth University. He earned his PhD from Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay and did postdoctoral studies at Iowa, MIT and Illinois. He was awarded the Established Investigator Award by the American Heart Association and the Distinguished Scholarship Award by Virginia Commonwealth University.

His research interest includes Structural Biology, Drug Discovery and Development.

Dev Arya earned his B.Sc. (chemistry honors program) from St. Stephen's College, Delhi; and Ph.D. (Bioorganic Chemistry) from Northeastern University, Boston. After spending his postdoctoral years in the labs of Prof. T. C. Bruice (UC Santa Barbara), he joined the faculty at Clemson University. Dr. Arya is a recipient of a National Science Foundation CAREER Award (2002) and the ACS Horace S. Isbell Award of the Division of Carbohydrate Chemistry (2007). He has served as the Program Chair (2004-2008), Chair-Elect (2009-2010) and Chair (2010-2011) of the ACS Division of Carbohydrate Chemistry.

His research interest includes the design, and discovery of new motifs for the molecular recognition of biological macromolecules.

JDM has completed his PhD at Carlsberg Laboratory, before he moved to Danisco, now Danisco/Dupont, where he worked 20 years as scientist and Research Manager and finally Director of Research in Danisco Biotechnology. He moved to the Technical University in 2008 with a Danisco grant to establish a group working on enzymes, hydrocolloids and prebiotic oligosaccharides. He has published 138 publications and 25 Patents.

His research interest includes functional glycans and human milk oligosaccharides.

Rachel Chen received her PhD from California Institute of Technology in 1994 and subsequently worked as a research scientist in Bristol-Myers Squibb. She began her independent academic career in Virginia Commonwealth University and continues at Georgia Institute of Technology. Her research interfaces biology, chemistry, and engineering with major focuses on applying molecular engineering tools in the synthesis of molecules that are not attainable with conventional means. She has published ~80 peer-reviewed papers and has been serving as an associate editor for Microbial Cell Factories and on editorial boards of AIMS Bioengineering and AIMS Microbiology.

Her research interfaces biology, chemistry, and engineering with major focuses on applying molecular engineering tools in the synthesis of molecules that are not attainable with conventional means.

Cheorl-Ho Kim has completed his Ph.D at the age of 28 years from The University of Tokyo and was positioned as a senior scientist from Korea Research Institute of Bioscience and Biotechnology. He is a professor of Molecular Glycobiology, SungKyunKwan University, Korea, leading organization of Korea, which is cooperated with the SamSung Group. He has published more than 341 papers in reputed journals and serving as an editorial board member, executive editor and editor-in chief of the international journals. His work was contributed to the mechanisms of glycan-mediated Hepatis B viral oncogenesis and invasion, sialoglycan-mediated leukemic differentiation and vascular biology. He is being serves as an Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Glycobiology, Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Microbial and Biochemical Technology, Executive Editor of Journal of Glycomics and Lipidomics, Editor of eCAM, Editor of The Peer Journal and Editor of Current Pharmaceutical Biotechnology.

His research work was contributed to the mechanisms of glycan-mediated Hepatis B viral oncogenesis and invasion, sialoglycan-mediated leukemic differentiation and vascular biology.

Tongzhong Ju received his M.D. degree from the Qingdao Medical College
in1986 and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Fudan University Shanghai
Medical School (former Shanghai Medical University, China) in 1994. He
completed his post-doctoral training in Biochemistry/Glycobiology in 1999, worked as a Research Associate (1999-2002) and Research Assistant
Professor (2002-2006) at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences
Center (OUHSC). He has published more than 50 papers in many different reputable journals.

His research interest mainly includes the study of glycan biomarkers for human diseases.

Amélia Pilar Rauter has made her Habilitation at Faculty of Sciences, University of Lisbon (FCUL, 2002) and completed her Ph.D. at Technische Universitaet Graz, Austria (1982). She is the Head of the Carbohydrate Chemistry Group - Center of Chemistry and Biochemistry (FCUL), and has been serving as Editor (RSC Carbohydrate Chemistry book series), Associated Editor (Mediterranean Journal of Chemistry), and member of journals advisory board in Organic/Carbohydrate Chemistry. She is Secretary of the European Carbohydrate Organisation and Secretary of the IUPAC Division on Organic and Biomolecular Chemistry, has published more than 130 papers and book chapters, and authored 12 patents.

Antimicrobial drugs and glycolipids.

Dr. Kubick is head of the department “Cell-free Bioproduction” at the Fraunhofer IZI-BB. His laboratory exploits cell-free protein synthesis as a versatile tool for membrane protein and glycoprotein synthesis, as well as chip-based protein synthesis and translational regulation. In collaboration with Qiagen GmbH he developed novel eukaryotic in vitro translation systems. Dr. Kubick is also a lecturer at the Free University of Berlin and the University of Potsdam. He is an affiliate of the Technical University of Berlin and Lecturer at the University of Applied Sciences, Berlin, Germany.

His research interest includes glycoprotein synthesis, as well as chip-based protein synthesis and translational regulation.

Ulrich Zähringer obtained his PhD degree in 1979 with H Grisebach, Biochemistry of Plants, Freiburg University, Germany. In 1981 he moved with Prof. Ernst T Rietschel, Director at the Research Center Borstel, where he obtained a tenure position as head of the Division of Immunochemistry. He made three postdoctoral trainings: i) 1980-1981 in O Lüderitz’s Lab at the Max-Planck-Institute for Immunobiology, Freiburg; ii) 1983-1984 at T Shiba’s and S Kusumoto’s Lab, University of Osaka, Faculty of Sciences, Osaka, Japan, and iii) during 2004-2005 with S Grzesiek, NMR Structural Biology at the Biozentrum in Basel, Switzerland. In 1996 he finished his habilitation and promoted in 2002 as extraordinary Professor at the University of Lübeck till his retirement in 2012. He published more than 250 papers in peer-reviews journals and 55 reviews.

His major interests are the analysis of structure-function relationship of pro-inflammatory bacterial compounds, such as lipopolysaccharide (LPS), oligosaccharides, lipopeptides, lipoteichoic acids (LTA) and peptidoglycan (PGN).

Prof. Joon Kim has completed his BS and MS in Microbiology from Seoul National University, PhD in Biochemistry from the University of California at Berkeley and postdoctoral study from Harvard Medical School. He is a Professor in the Division of Life Sciences, and the Director of Radiation Safety and Management Center, Korea University, Seoul, Korea. He has published more than 150 papers in reputed journals

Cancer and Cancer Marker.

Nada Al-Hasawi graduated from the Faculty of Science at Kuwait University in 1995 with a degree of Biochemistry and subsequently an M. Sc. In 1999. She worked first as Scientific Assistant, then as Department Technician and then for 5 years as a Teaching Assistant in the Faculty of Pharmacy at Kuwait University before taking up a scholarship to study for a Ph. D. at the Institute of Cancer Therapeutic at Bradford University, England. Following its completiion in 2008 she was appointed to her present position as Assistant Professor in Departmenmt of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy at Kuwait University. Dr Al Hasawi’s current interests focus on the role of polysialic acid in metastatic cancers.

Dr Al Hasawi’s current interests focus on the role of polysialic acid in metastatic cancers.

Dr. Ming Zhang received the Ph.D. degree (Summa Cum Laude) from University of Gottingen, Germany. She has over a decade experience in infectious diseases, in particular targeting vaccine designs for HIV and influenza viruses. She is an Assistant Professor of Epidemiology at University of Georgia, USA, and leads an interdisciplinary research group towards understanding pathogen diversity and mechanisms for vaccine design purposes. She is also keen in educating the next generation of critical thinkers and innovators in infectious diseases.

Her research interests includes N-linked glycosylation and infectious diseases.

Joe Barchi received his Ph.D. in Synthetic/Marine Natural Products Chemistry from the University of Hawaii and was a postdoctoral fellow at Duke University. He then joined the National Cancer Institute as a staff fellow in the Laboratory of Medicinal Chemistry in 1988 where he rose to his current position of Senior Scientist/Principal Investigator and NMR Facility Head at the newly formed Chemical Biology Laboratory.

His main research interests are in synthetic medicinal chemistry as it relates to carbohydrate-based drug design, the development of novel sugar-conjugated nanoparticles and the high-resolution structural analysis of sugars, glycopeptides and small molecule drug candidates by NMR spectroscopy.

Neil Price has a Ph.D. from the University of London, and has postdoctoral experience at the Univ. of Geneva in Switzerland, Paul-Sabatier University in Toulouse, and the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center in Athens, GA. He held a faculty position the U. of Rochester, NY before moving to the NCAUR, Peoria.

His research includes carbohydrate chemistry and biochemistry, mass spectrometry, and microbial metabolism. He currently serves on the ARS National Chemical Patent committee, and has over 90 peer-reviewed research publications.

Dr. Martinez Duncker is 37 years old and born in Mexico City. He earned his MD degree in the Military Medical School in Mexico after which he went to Paris, France to earn his PhD degree in the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes. He is Director of the Cell Dynamics Research Center of the Morelos State Autonomous University in Cuernavaca, Mexico where he leads the Glycobiology and Human Genetics Program. He also is founder and President of the Latin American Society of Glycobiology.

His research includes the identification of novel sialoproteins and sialolipids through this approach sheds light into novel functions of sialic acids during Th activation.

George Bousfield completed his PhD at Indiana University in 1981. He then pursued postdoctoral studies at the University of Texas, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center with Darrell Ward. He is currently the Dr. L.M. Jones Distinguished Professor in the Fairmount College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Wichita State University, and director of the WSU Protein Core Facility. He has published more than 56 journal articles.

His research interests are follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) and luteinizing hormone (LH), play central roles in the control of reproduction by connecting neuroendocrine hypothalamic/pituitary activities to gonadal function.

Ying Qing is a Principal Scientist in the Pharmaceutical group at Waters Corporation. She joined Waters Corporation since 2001, shortly after she received her Ph.D. from the Analytical Chemistry Department at Purdue University. She is a group leader in the Biopharmaceutical lab unit at Waters. Her group’s focus is on Protein Biotherapeutics characterization using UPLC/QTOF MS platform. The projects she is currently working on range from glycan profiling, peptide mapping and lately the Hydrogen Deuterium Exchange Mass Spectrometry for protein higher order structure analysis. She has extensive experience in Mass Spectrometry, Gas-Phase Ion Chemistry and Liquid Chromatography Separation Techniques.

Her research interest focus is on Protein Biotherapeutics characterization using UPLC/QTOF MS platform.

Professor Marzabadi completed her PhD at the University of Missouri – St. Louis and carried out postdoctoral studies at Hunter College- CUNY. She has been at Seton Hall University for the past 15 years and has been a Visiting Professor at Harvard University Medical School and a Visiting Researcher at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. She has published numerous papers in the carbohydrate literature and currently serves as a Member at Large for the ACS Division of Carbohydrate Chemistry.

Her research interest includes the synthesis and biological evaluation of new carbohydrate structures with the capacity to act as immunomodulators.

Guijun Wang has completed her PhD in 1999 from Michigan State University and postdoctoral research at Yale University in 2002. She started her independent career as an assistant professor at the University of New Orleans in 2002. In 2012, she relocated to Old Dominion University (ODU), currently she is a professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at ODU.

Her research interests include synthetic methodology development; asymmetric synthesis; and the synthesis and study of carbohydrate based self-assembling systems. She has co-authored 50 peer reviewed papers and is the co-inventor on 20 international and US patents.

Konrad Sandhoff completed his PhD in biochemistry in Munich. After research stays in Munich, Israel and the USA he became a full professor of biochemistry at the University of Bonn in 1979. Since 2007 he is a senior professor at the LIMES institute, Bonn.

Major Research Interests: Molecular life sciences: analysis and pathobiochemistry of lysosomal (glyco-)sphingolipid storage diseases, structure and function of lysosomal enzymes and lipid binding proteins, topology of endocytosis and glycolipid metabolism, and regulation of glycolipid biosynthesis. He has published more than 480 peer-reviewed papers. Among many other prizes he also received the International Glycoconjugate Organization Award (2005).

Jiahua (Jay) Xie has completed his PhD in Biophysics at the age of 31 from Zhejiang University and postdoctoral studies from Departments of Genetics and Horticultural Science, North Carolina State University. He served as a Senior Scientist at the Vector Research Inc. (a subsidiary of Vector Group Ltd) for five years. Currently, he is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences and the PI of the BRITE, NCCU. He has published more than 50 papers in reputed journals and has been serving as an editorial board member of Journal of Zhejiang University (Agriculture and Life Sciences).

His research areas include Asialo-rhuEPO, a non-hematopoietic recombinant human erythropoietin (EPO) derivative lacking sialic acid, has been reported to display broad tissue-protective effects against damage triggered by ischemia/reperfusion, hypoxia or cytotoxic agents in the brain, the heart, the kidneys and the liver.

Dr Tony Velkov completed PhD in 2000 from Monash University. His anti-infective discovery research is at the leading edge globally. He was awarded a NHMRC Research Fellowships in 2006, 2011 and 2014. The quality and impact of his independent research was recognized by the NHMRC with an Excellence Award in 2011. He has published over 50 papers in high-caliber journals, 3 book chapters and 15 conference presentations. The dynamic team he leads consists of 3 postdocs, 3 RAs and 9 PhD students. Over the last 6 years, he has obtained >$9M funding from the NIH, NHMRC and foundations.

His research includes Influenza a constant global burden to human health.

Barbara Klajnert-Maculewicz has completed her Ph.D in 2002 from the University of Lodz, Poland and postdoctoral studies from the McMaster University, Ontario, Canada. She is a professor at the University of Lodz, Poland and an external scientific member at Leibniz IPF in Dresden, Germany. She is a co-author of 2 books and 9 chapters in monographs. She has published more than 90 papers in reputed journals (h-index 23). In the years 2009-2012 she was the Management Committee Chair of COST Action TD0802 “Dendrimers in biomedical applications” that gathered 24 countries. She has been awarded L’Oréal-UNESCO Fellowship for Women in Science.

Her research interests include Anticancer drugs such as cytarabine (araC) belong to nucleoside analogues (NAs). NAs are commonly used in the treatment of acute myeloid leukemia, acute lymphocytic leukemia, and lymphomas.

Dr. Wu obtained his Ph.D degree with W. Pigman, who is the pioneer in glycoproteins, at New York Medical College; and had his postdoctoral training at E.A. Kabat’s Lab for quantitative immunochemistry, Columbia University Medical Center, New York. He joined as a faculty position at Texas A&M University in 1982; promoted as a full professor at Chang-Gung University since 1989; and as Emeritus Professor in 2011. Dr. Wu published over 120 polyvalent glycotopes related papers. He is the chief editor for three volumes of Molecular Immunology of Complex Carbohydrates 1 to 3 in Adv. Exp. Med. Biol. 228, 451, 705 (Springer Publisher).

His major interests are (i) Glycan purification and characterization; (ii) recognition factors of glycans; (iii) combining sites of lectins and antibodies. He received many Outstanding Research Awards (1997-2008) from government agents in Taiwan.