Having been educated at Christ Church, Oxford and University College, London in Biochemistry (First Class Honours), Chemical Microbiology and Biochemical Engineering he then spent 7 years as a Senior Process Engineer in industry. The last 3 years in America were spent with Merck Sharpe and Dohme where he was introduced to animal cell biotechnology and the production of viruses for use in veterinary and human vaccines. On returning to the UK he worked for 10 years at the Animal Virus Research Institute, Pirbright, scaling-up bioreactors for virus vaccine production processes and maximizing the biological productivity of the BHK cell lines for Foot-and-Mouth Disease virus generation. He then moved to the University of Surrey as Professor and was Head of Microbiology (7 years) and was then (1997) appointed to the first chair in the UK in ‘Science and Engineering Ethics’. His publication record includes over 200 research papers and reviews along with over 20 edited books and an encyclopedia on animal and plant cell culture technology. In 2002 his book ‘Ethics Tools and the Engineer’ was published by CRC Press. He is currently the Vaccine Series Editor in Chief, and Editor in Chief of Vaccine Research Quarterly, Procedia in Vaccinology, Trials in Vaccinology and ‘Science and Engineering Ethics’. Having founded the European Society for Animal Cell Technology in 1975 and the International Society for Vaccines in 1996 (President: 2007-11), he was elected to be President of the European Association for Higher Education in Biotechnology in 2000.

Alexander von Gabain obtained his Ph.D. in Genetics at the University of Heidelberg and held a post-doctorate position at the Stanford University. In the 1980s and 1990s, he was Professor at the University of Umeå and at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, as well as an advisor to pharmaceutical and biotech companies. From 1992 to 1998, he was Chair of Microbiology of the University of Vienna at the Campus Vienna Biocenter, Austria and has helped to build the public private partnership of the Vienna Biocenter/IMP. In 1998, he cofounded Intercell AG and led the company as CEO until it was successfully floated on the Vienna Stock Exchange in 2005. From 2005 to 2009, he was Member of the Executive Management Board and CSO of the Company. Since then, he has been serving the Company as strategic advisor and chair of the Scientific Advisory Board.

His research interest is in the field of bio medical research and documented by a large number of publications, book chapters and patents. He is professor of Microbiology at the Max Perutz Laboratories of the University of Vienna, and foreign adjunct professor at the Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, member of several professional organizations and serves on the boards of biotech enterprises, including TVM Capital, Munich. In 2008, he was appointed to the Governing Board of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), where he is involved with the innovative entrepreneurship agenda. His achievements have been acknowledged by prestigious industrial awards, academic prizes, honourable memberships, including the Swedish Royal Academy of Engineering Science.

Charung Muangchana is a graduate of Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University (JHU), Baltimore, USA (2007), for International Health (Disease Prevention and Control; Vaccine Science and Policy as well as Economic Evaluation on Health) for his PhD, and of Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, Thailand (1990) for his MD. He is also a field epidemiologist by training from the Ministry of Public Health (Field Epidemiology Training Program: FETP). He got many publications on international and domestic peer review journals on variety of health issues, including vaccine and immunization. He has been a director of the National Vaccine Institute (NVI) Thailand, since 2007. The NVI is a new institute at national level to coordinate national vaccine policy and strategy. The NVI aims to promote vaccine research and development as well as policy development on immunization in the country, which Thailand has high capacity on vaccine development and production. Before joining the NVI he worked as a medical practitioner and directors of community hospitals in Southern Thailand.

Dr. Leonard A Smith received a B.A. degree in chemistry and zoology from the University of New Hampshire in 1972 and his Ph.D. degree in biochemistry from Georgetown University in 1978. He is the Senior Research Scientist (ST) for Medical Countermeasures Technology at USAMRMC and Scientific Director at USAMRIID. Dr. Smith has authored or co-authored more than 150 scientific publications, reviews and book chapters, and holds several patents for his work on bio-defense vaccine development. He has received numerous awards including the DOD Distinguished Civilian Service Award, the highest award given by the Secretary of Defense to career employees.

Nikolai Petrovsky MBBS, FRACP, Ph.D. is an active hospital clinician, research professor at Flinders Medical Centre, Adelaide Australia and research director of Vaxine, an Australian vaccine development company. He is Secretary-General of the International Immunomics Society and has received major funding from the US National Institutes of Health to develop novel biodefense vaccines and adjuvants. He has won prestigious awards including the AMP Innovation Award at the 2009 Telstra Business Awards and an Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year in 2010. He has taken four vaccines to the clinic and has authored over 100 scientific papers and book chapters.

Pathogenesis of type 1 diabetes, Obesity and type 2 diabetes, Vaccine development and Immuno-informatics

Maurizio Chiriva Internati completed his degree in biological sciences at the University of Milan, Italy and doctorates of immunology at the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom and morphological sciences at the University of Milan, Italy. He completed his postdoctoral research on tumor immunology, virology and cancer vaccine studies from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. Currently, he is the director of Basic and Translational Research at the division on Hematology & Oncology at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, School of Medicine, and is a senior editor for the journal, International Reviews of Immunology. He has published more than 100 papers in peer reviewed journals and serves as on the editorial board of several reputed cancer journals

Hematology, Oncology and Immunotherapeutic strategies for solid and non-solid tumors

Wu Yuzhang, born in 1963, Shandong Qingzhou, Immunology PhD, Professor, PhD supervisor. Currently the director of Basical Medicine College of Third Military Medical University, director of Institute of Immunology of PLA, director of National Engineering Research Center for biological products, director of National and Local Joint Engineering Labolatory for peptide drugs, director of National Biological Industry Base (Chongqing) pharmaceutical pilot production center. Professor Wu is a pioneer in antigen project field and an academic leader in China’s therapeutic vaccine field. He is the winner of National Outstanding Youth Science Fund, Ministry of Education “Changjiang Scholar” Distinguished Professor, elected to the National New Century Talents Project, enjoying special government allowances, General Logistics Department “Technology Golden Star”, military academies “Yucai Award” Gold Award and other honors. Academic position: Member of the Sixth discipline review group of Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council, member of National Postdoctoral Mobile Station evaluation committee, member of National Pharmacopoeia Committee, biological and medicine department member of the Sixth National Ministry of education science and technology committee, National Natural Science Foundation discipline review group member, National Drug Evaluation Committee expert, New drug innovation National Science and Technology Major Special responsible expert, standing director of Chinese Society of Immunology, council member of Biophysical Society of China, Director of PLA professional committee of Immunology, Standing Committee of the General Logistics Department science and technology committee, chairman of Chongqing Society for Immunology, “Immunological Journal” chief editor and so on.

Dr. Shirwan is Dr. Michael and Joan Hamilton Endowed Chair in Autoimmune Disease, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology, Director of Molecular Immunomodulation Program at the Institute for Cellular Therapeutics. He conducted his graduate studies at the University of California in Santa Barbara, CA, and postdoctoral studies at California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, CA. He joined the University of Louisville in 1998 after holding academic appointments at various institutions in the United States. Dr. Shirwan’s research focuses on the modulation of immune system for the treatment of immune-based diseases with particular focus on type 1 diabetes, transplantation, and vaccines. Dr. Shirwan is an inventor on 16 worldwide patens, widely published, lectured at numerous national/international conferences, served on study sections for various federal and non-profit funding agencies, and is on the Editorial Board of 16 scientific journals. He is member of several national and international societies and recipient of various awards.

Type 1 diabetes, Graft rejection, Bone marrow transplantation and Vaccines (cancer and infectious diseases)

Dr. De-chu C. Tang is a Korean Brain Pool Program Scientist and the Scientific Founder of Vaxin Inc. He obtained his Ph.D. in Microbiology from Indiana University in 1989. He carried out his postdoctoral work at Baylor College of Medicine, Duke University, and the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. He joined the faculty at the University of Alabama at Birmingham in 1994; subsequently founded Vaxin Inc. on UAB campus in 1997; and was responsible for Vaxin’s daily operation as the Chief Scientific Officer until 2012. Dr. Tang was one of the pioneers during the development of DNA vaccines, noninvasive skin patch vaccines, adenovirus-vectored influenza and anthrax vaccines, adenovirus-vectored poultry vaccines, as well as the drug-vaccine duo platform technology. He received the Wallace H. Coulter Award for innovation and entrepreneurship in 2000; Vaxin Inc. was selected as a Tech Museum Awards Laureate in 2007; Dr. Tang was selected as a distinguished overseas scientist by the Korean Brain Pool Program in 2012 and subsequently recruited to Chung-Ang University and International Vaccine Institute in Seoul as a Scientist

His special interests include treatment of the common cold, prophylaxis and treatment of infections in transplant recipients, and hepatitis C virus epidemiology.

Dr. Jeffrey Ulmer received his B.Sc. with honors from the Department of Chemistry at the University of Regina in 1978 and was the recipient of the Merit Award of the Society of Chemical Industry of Canada. He received his Ph.D. in biochemistry from McGill University in 1985 and completed his postdoctoral training in the laboratory of Nobel laureate Dr. George Palade in the Department of Cell Biology at Yale University School of Medicine. At Merck Research Laboratories and Chiron Corporation he conducted seminal studies on DNA vaccines, and novel vaccine adjuvants and delivery systems. He has published over 190 scientific articles, is on the editorial boards of Expert Opinion on Biological Therapy and Human Vaccines, and serves on several external advisory boards. He is currently Global Head of External Research at Novartis Vaccines & Diagnostics, responsible for identification and assessment of new opportunities for collaborative research.

Manmohan Singh, Ph.D. is currently the Head of Technical Development (TD) within Novartis Vaccines in Holly Springs, NC USA. He joined NVD TD in 2012 and prior to that had spent 16 years in the Research Division of formerly Chiron and now Novartis Vaccines. He was part of the Chiron/NVD vaccines research team that over the years has developed several innovative antigen and adjuvant delivery technologies. He is a licensed Pharmacist and holds a Masters and a Ph.D. in Pharmaceutics from the National Institute of Immunology, New Delhi India. Dr. Singh is the author of over 120 original research publications, editor of four books on vaccine research and development and is an inventor on over 47 issued patents.

Geert Vanden Bossche obtained his DVM at the Veterinary Faculty of Ghent and his PhD in Virology at the University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart. Following his postdoctoral training in virology, immunology and molecular biology at the Free University of Berlin and Hohenheim (Germany), where he subsequently held adjunct faculty appointments, he transitioned to the Vaccine Industry where he served various senior roles in both early and late vaccine development at GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals, Novartis Vaccines & Diagnostics and Solvay Biologicals. He then joined the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to serve as SPO in Vaccine Discovery for Global Health. He is founder of UNIVAC llc in the US and UNIVAC NV in Belgium and visiting scientist at the REGA Institute, University of Leuven (Belgium).
Geert is board certified in virology and microbiology, the author of over 30 publications, and inventor on several patent applications. He has presented vaccine- and adjuvant-related topics at multiple international congresses.

Jon Heinrichs is the Director of Microbial Vaccines at Merck Research Laboratories in West Point, PA, where he leads a team of scientists developing vaccines for several bacterial pathogens including Clostridium difficile, Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus pneumoniae, and Chlamydia trachomatis. Prior to joining Merck, Dr. Heinrichs held positions of increasing responsibility at the biotechnology company, MedImmune, where he contributed to the identification of vaccine candidates for numerous bacterial pathogens, particularly S. pneumoniae. He was also involved in research on the efficacy of monoclonal antibodies for the prevention of infectious diseases and the treatment of cancer, and was head of the In Vivo Biology group. Dr. Heinrichs earned his doctoral degree in microbiology and molecular genetics from Rutgers University and the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, elucidating the pathogenesis of the food-borne organism Bacillus cereus, and completed a post-doctoral fellowship in the Laboratory of Bacterial Pathogenesis and Immunology at The Rockefeller University where he examined global regulation in S. aureus.

Dr. Yongqun “Oliver” He is an associate professor in the University of Michigan Medical School. Dr. He is experienced in both vaccinology and computer sciences. His primary interests are host-vaccine interaction mechanism analysis, vaccine development, computational vaccinology, and bioinformatics. His group has developed many vaccine informatics programs including the VIOLIN vaccine database and analysis system and Vaxign vaccine design program. Dr. He initiated and leads the development of the community-based Vaccine Ontology (VO). Dr. He has published over 50 peer-reviewed papers and is an editorial board member of several journals. More information about Dr. He and his laboratory is available at: http://www.hegroup.org/.

Dr. Tary-Lehmann received her M.D. and Ph.D. in Immunology, both from the University of Tübingen, Germany. Her postdoctoral training in Immunology was at the University of California, Los Angeles. Thereafter, she went on to Case Western Reserve University as a faculty member, where she was awarded tenure and appointed Associate Professor in the Department of Pathology in 2003. As Chief Scientific Officer for CTL, she provides guidance and oversight for technical operations, ensuring the ongoing scientific excellence of the company. For more than 10 years, she has worked with various pharmaceutical and biotechnology clients in developing, validating and performing regulated immunology assays in CTL’s GLP- and CLIA- compliant laboratory

Dr. John Dong is President and CEO of GenPhar, Inc. Under John\'s leadership, GenPhar, Inc. has been focusing its efforts in developing vaccines and therapies against infectious diseases using a unique vaccine platform. Scientists at GenPhar have developed a number of multivalent vaccines against lethal viruses. John has established close collaborations with divisions of the United States Department of Defense (DoD) and National Institutes of Health (NIH). John\'s collaborations include: working with NIH to develop an HIV vaccine that induces both neutralizing and CTL responses; partnering with the US Army Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) to develop a bivalent Ebola vaccine and a trivalent Marburg vaccine; and a joint effort with the US Navy Medical Research Center (NMRC) to develop a tetravalent dengue vaccine against all four serotypes of the dengue virus. John has also been leading the effort to develop commercial applications of the platform, including hepatitis, Influenza, RSV and a West Nile virus vaccine. Dr. Dong also has a long academic career. He obtained his medical degree at the Capital Medical Institute in Beijing, and his doctorate in molecular virology and immunology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). He joined the faculty at UAB almost immediately after obtaining his Ph.D. with joint affiliations with both the Department of Physiology and Biophysics and the Gregory Fleming James Cystic Fibrosis Research Center. He then continued his successful academic career at the University of California-San Francisco (UCSF), and as a Professor in the Dept. of Microbiology and Immunology at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). Dr. Dong is an expert in molecular virology and immunology and has published regularly in scientific journals such as the Journal of Virology, Human Gene Therapy, and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). John served as the principal investigator on a number of federally funded grants and contracts, and his research has resulted in multiple patent awards

Periasamy Selvaraj received his Masters degree in Biochemistry from University of Madras, Chennai, India and his Ph.D. from Christian Medical College, Vellore, India. He did his postdoctoral fellowship in cell adhesion receptors of the immune system at Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School, Boston under the supervision of Dr. Timothy A. Springer. Currently, he is a Professor in the Department of Pathology at Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA, USA. His laboratory focuses on developing cancer vaccines using novel protein transfer approaches, which could be used as an alternative to gene transfer based cancer vaccines in human clinical settings. He is also co-founder of Metaclipse Therapeutics Corporation, which is in developing personalized immunotherapy for cancers. He has published more than 80 research papers in national and international journals.

Cancer Vaccines

Currently serves as the Head Section of Infectious Diseases at the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada. Previously he headed the infectious disease unit and was acting head of Internal Medicine B at the Chaim Seba Medical Center, Israel. He was Lecturer in Medicine at the faculties of medicine in Tel Aviv University, Paris University VII and visiting associate professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
Prof. Rubinstein serves in the advisory board of numerous pharmaceutical and Biotech companies such as Bayer, BMS and GSK, and sits in the Scientific Advisory Board of Rosetta Genomics and BiondVax. He is currently the Chairman of the Israeli Society for infectious diseases and member of numerous international societies and committees. He serves on a dozen of Editorial boards of Medical Journals and has published over 300 medical publication, books and monographs.
Prof. Rubinstein holds an MD degree from Basel University and received his specialist degree in internal medicine from NYU. In addition to his medical degree Prof. Rubinstein holds an LLB degree from the Tel Aviv University.

Dr Alsharifi grew up in Babylon/Iraq and studied Veterinary Medicine at Baghdad University. He was increasingly interested in medical research and after coming to Australia he studied Biomedical Science at Monash University. He then moved to the Australian National University to take up a PhD scholarship at The John Curtin School of Medical Research, and investigated with Arno Müllbacher, Robert Blanden, and Mario Lobigs the immunobiology of an alphavirus infection. During his early years in research he discovered a period of exhaustion in type-I interferon response following an acute viral infection, which may explain the clinically known observation that virus-infected patients are at increased risk to a more sever secondary viral and/or bacterial infection. Following the completion of his Ph.D. studies, he investigated with Prof Müllbacher the possibility of using gamma-irradiated influenza virus as a universal flu vaccine. In 2008, he was awarded the Hanson Fellowship to continue his research into the universal Flu vaccine and also to investigate the possibility of producing other viral vaccines using similar technique to that used for influenza. His flu vaccine research has been featured in the Catalyst program on ABC (http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/2613604.htm), and in many newspaper articles such as (http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,,25625291-5018662,00.html) and (http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,25406694-5006301,00.html).

Cross-Protective influenza vaccine
Exhaustion of IFN-I response and the susceptibility to secondary infections

Dr. Yasuhiro Yasutomi DVM, Ph.D. is an immunologist in vaccine development field. He was a Research fellow (Immunology), 1990-1991. at Harvard Medical School from 1990-1991 and then Instructor 1992-1994. He was Instructor in Medicine at Department of Viral Pathogenesis in Beth Israel Hospital in Harvard Medical School from 1994-1996. He was associate professor in Mie University Graduate School of Medicine from1996-2007. He is Director at Tsukuba Primate Research Center in National Institute of Biomedical Innovation, and Professor in Mie University Graduate School of Medicine in July 2007 to present.

New technology of vaccine vector

Dr. Uzonna obtained DVM and Ph.D. in Immunology from the University of Saskatchewan, Canada. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania, USA, he was recruited to the Department of Immunology, University of Manitoba in 2004. His research program focuses on understanding cellular and molecular mechanisms that regulate the induction, maintenance and loss of protective immunity to protozoan parasites, with a view to exploiting the information gained from these studies for the development of effective vaccines and vaccination strategies against these infections. Dr. Uzonna is currently an Associate Professor of Immunology and the Leader of Parasite Vaccines Development Research Group.

Dr. Tatjana Pljesa received her medical education (MD), specialization (specialist in microbiology and parasitology) and postgraduate studies in Clinical and Experimental Bacteriology at the Medical Faculty, University of Belgrade, Serbia. She is the author of over 30 publications in the field of microbiology and immunology. She has a great experience in production of viral vaccines, bacterial vaccines and diagnostic devices. She was Production Director in the Institute of Virology, Vaccines and Sera Torlak. and now she works in bacterial vaccine production area as Team leader in establishing single-use WAVE technology in the production of pertussis vaccine, diphtheria toxoid and tetanus toxoid projects. Prior to this, she was the Head of Vaccine Production Department, where she managed the production of pertussis vaccine. She was involved in the study of comparing clinical isolates and vaccine strains of Bordetella pertussis by serotyping and genotyping, as a part of the project of surveillance of B. pertussis antigenic divergence and pertussis re-emergence in countries with high vaccination coverage.

Vaccine production, Vaccine R&D, Microbiology & Immunology and Development of new products, using single-use technology.

Zarema Obradović, MD, Ph.D., specialist of epidemiology, Bosnia and Herzegovina, married. Main areas of work: epidemiology, facultative immunisation, travel medicine, public health. Present positions: Professor at the Faculty for Health Studies, University of Sarajevo; Professor at the Medical Faculty, University of Tuzla; Epidemiologist, Public Health Institute Sarajevo; Focal Point for International Health Regulations (2005) for FB&H; Coordinator for Noncommunicable Diseases (NCD) for FB&H. Member of Association of epidemiologists of FB&H, Academy of Science and Arts B&H for Public Health, Bosnian-Herzegovinian American Academy of Arts and Sciences (BHAAAS), MetaNet - Accademic association for communicable diseases in South-East Europe- DAAD, CCM for TB and HIV/AIDS - B&H. Visiting professor at Medical Faculty, Bucharest, Romania; external evaluator for Ph.D. thesis at the University Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan. Published 170 scientific papers in different publications, medical journals, nacional and international symposiums and congresses. Published books: “Echinococcosis”, “International Travelers Healthcare”, “Epidemiology and Health Statistics”