Category: International Scientific Committee

Olaf W. R. Strauß, Professor

Description

Since 2012 he is a W2 Professor for Experimental Ophthalmology at Charité University Medicine Berlin. Between 2007 and 2012 Prof. Olaf Wolfgang Ralph Strauß worked as W2 Professor for Experimental Ophthalmology at the University Medical Center Regensburg. In the years 2002-2007, he was a C3 Professor for Experimental Ophthalmology, at UKE University of Hamburg. During 1999-2002 Prof. Olaf Wolfgang Ralph Straußwas a Research Associate (C1) at the Institute of Clinical Physiology in FU Berlin. From 1994 to 1999 he was a Postdoc and teaching assistant at the Institute of Clinical Physiology, UKBF in FU Berlin.

Olaf W. R. Strauß is the current Chair of ICTER International Scientific Committee for the term 2024-2028.

Francesca Fanelli, Professor

Description

Prof. Francesca Fanelli works at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (UNIMORE), the Department of Life Sciences in Modena, Italy. She owns a Master degree in Medicinal Chemistry, University of Bari, Italy (1989) and a PhD in Medicinal Chemistry in the area of Computational Medicinal and Biophysical Chemistry from the University of Bari (1994). From 1994 to 2001 she was a postdoctoral fellow at UNIMORE with frequent visits at the University of Lausanne  (Switzerland) in the context of scientific collaboration. In the years 2000 to 2005 Prof. Fanelli worked as an external consultant of Serono Pharmaceutical Research Institute (Geneva, Switzerland). From 2002 to 2006 she was an Assistant Scientist of the Dulbecco Telethon Institute (DTI), hosted by the Department of Chemistry, UNIMORE. DTI is a program of personal awards conceived to avoid “Brain Drain” or allow “Brain Gain”. In the years 2007-2011, she was an Associate Scientist of DTI, hosted by the Department of Chemistry, UNIMORE. Later from 2007 to 2019 she was an Associate Professor of Biochemistry, the Department of Life Sciences, UNIMORE, and from 2019 to present she is a Professor of Biochemistry, the Department of Life Sciences, UNIMORE. Since 2002 she is the Leader of the Computational Structural Biology group (https://www.csbl.unimore.it/) at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia.

Her main research topics include:  

  • Computational modeling and simulations of RasGTPases and their GEFs, with focus on GPCRs and heterotrimeric G proteins;
  • structural determinants of rod opsin mutations linked to autosomal dominant Retinitis Pigmentosa;
  • development and applications of software for the structural analysis of molecular simulations;
  • development and application of tools and protocols for predicting supra-macromolecular assemblies;
  • structure-based drug discovery/design.

The full list of publications can be found at:

https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=tkFT9g4AAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate.

Majlinda Lako, Professor

University Degree:

Biochemistry and Genetics graduate from Faculty of Natural Sciences in Tirana, Albania.

For her PhD studies in Human Genetics in 1993 she joined the lab of two world known geneticists, Prof. Tom Strachan and Susan Lindsay, in Newcastle, where she cloned and characterised novel genes involved in development of the brain. These led to a great interest in pluripotent stem cell biology, which she studied at Durham University. In 2003, she established her own research group at Newcastle University’s Institute of Genetic Medicine, where she pioneered the establishment of human pluripotent stem cells and development of robust methods for generation of light responsive retinal organoids for disease modelling, drug discovery and therapeutic applications. Studying the developmental biology and disease of the eye is a core activity of her research group. Dysfunction of any of the cell types that reside in the retina or supporting cells, the retinal pigmented epithelium (RPE), which is vital for the health of the retina, will disrupt vision. The aim of her research group is to determine the mechanisms that cause such disruption and find ways to repair the damage.

She is the Co-director of Regenerative Medicine, Stem Cells and Transplantation, a member of the Biosciences Institute and her work contributes to the Regenerative Medicine, Stem Cells and Transplantation theme. She is also part of the Neuroscience NUCoRE.

James Bainbridge, Professor

University Degree:

Graduated in Medicine, University of Cambridge; Clinical Ophthalmology Training, Moorfields Eye Hospital.

James Bainbridge is a Consultant Retinal Surgeon at Moorfields Eye Hospital London and Chair of Retinal Studies at University College London. His postgraduate academic training, PhD and postdoctoral research at UCL were supported by Wellcome Trust Fellowships and a UK National Institute for Health Research Professorship. As a surgeon-scientist his aim is to protect and restore sight by developing new treatments for diseases of the retina. His programme of translational research extends from the laboratory investigation of mechanisms of disease to clinical trials of new medical and surgical interventions. Awards for his achievements include the US Foundation Fighting Blindness Board of Directors’ Award and the 2018 Champalimaud Vision Award. In 2020 he was elected Fellow of the UK Academy of Medical Sciences.

Andrew Dick, Professor

Description

Andrew D. Dick F. Med. Sci.

Director UCL- Institute of Ophthalmology

Duke Elder Professor of Ophthalmology, UCL Institute of Ophthalmology. London, UK

Professor of Ophthalmology, University of Bristol, UK

Co-Director of National Health Institute for Research Biomedical Research Centre, Moorfields Eye Hospital and UCL-Institute of Ophthalmology, London.

Professor Andrew Dick qualified in medicine also with a degree in Biochemistry (BSc (Hons)) from the University of London, and during his medical education he spent time as an MRC sponsored research associate in Biochemistry with Professor Coleman in Yale. Following training in internal medicine and MRCP he entered ophthalmology residency and obtained his postgraduate research degree inImmunology in 1993 at the University of Aberdeen with Professor John Forrester. He underwent an MRC Post Doctoral Travelling Fellowship to work with Jon Sedgwick at the Centenary Institute of Cancer Medicine and Cell Biology in Sydney Australia. His clinical expertise is in inflammatory eye disease, medical and surgical retina.

His research spans the basic and translational science conduit to early phase trials in inflammation as related to autoinflammatory, autoimmune and degenerative retinal disease, as well as randomized control trials for immunomodulatory therapy in uveitis. Professor Dick was made a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (UK) in 2007 for his significant contribution to research and scholarship in medicine and was awarded the Alcon Research Institute Research annual award in 2011.

Prior to becoming Director of UCL-Institute of Ophthalmology, he was Director of Research for the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry at University of Bristol. He has previously been Editor of British Journal of Ophthalmology, President of European Vision and Eye Research (EVER), Master of Oxford Ophthalmological Congress and vice-president of ARVO.

Prof. Andrew Dick was the Chair of ICTER International Scientific Committee for the term 2019-2024.

Dr. Kate Grieve

Description

Kate Grieve (>3370 citations, h-index 26, i10 index 46), research director and team leader at the Vision Institute, Paris; scientific director of the “Paris Eye Imaging” ocular imaging unit, at the Quinze Vingts National Ophthalmology Hospital, Paris; and president and founder of startup SharpEye, is an expert in optical imaging. Her research aims to develop non-invasive optical measurements of retinal cell structure and function in the living human eye, as well as in cell cultures in the lab. This development contributes to significantly improving the diagnosis and monitoring of ophthalmological pathologies, as well as to evaluating the results of innovative therapies. She was recently awarded a prestigious 5 year ERC Consolidator Grant, the “ilab” innovation award, the “Jean Jerphagnon” prize for optics and the “Innovators Prize” of the Ile-de-France region.

Pablo Artal, Professor

Description

Pablo Artal studied Physics at the University of Zaragoza. He was a pre-doctoral fellow at the Madrid-CSIC “Instituto de Optica” under the supervision of Javier Santamaria, a post-doctoral research fellow, first at Cambridge University (UK) and later at the Institut d’Optique in Orsay, France. He obtained a researcher position at the Instituto de Optica. In 1994, he became the first full Professor of Optics at the University of Murcia, Spain founding the “Laboratorio de Optica”. He spent sabbatical years in Rochester (USA) and Sydney (Australia) and currently is a distinguished visiting professor at the Central South University in Changsha, China. His research interests are centered on the optics of eye and the retina and the development of optical and electronic imaging techniques to be applied in Vision, Ophthalmology and Biomedicine.

He has published more than 300 reviewed papers that received more than 22200 citations (h-index of 78). He was elected fellow member of the Optical Society of America (OSA) in 1999, fellow of the Association for research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO) in 2009 and 2013 (gold class), fellow of the European Optical Society (EOS) in 2014 and fellow of the SPIE in 2016. In 2013, he received the “Edwin H. Land Medal” for scientific contributions to the advancement of diagnostic and correction alternatives in visual optics. In 2014, he was awarded with an Advanced Research grant of the European Research Council. In 2015, he received the “King Jaime I” award. In 2018, he was awarded the Spanish National Research award “Juan de la Cierva” and in 2019 the “Edgar D. Tillyer” award of the OSA for “the pioneering use of optics and photonics technologies to unravel the human visual system and to improve eye diagnostics and correction”. In 2021, he was awarded the medal of the Spanish Royal Physics Society. He is a co-inventor of 30 international patents in the fields of Optics and Ophthalmology and the co-founder of four spin-off.

Arie Gruzman, Associate Professor

Description

Arie Gruzman was born in Gorky, USSR in 1970. He graduated from First Nurse College, Gorky, USSR at 1988 (Practical Nursing, Summa cum Laude). After then, he started studying in Medical Institute, Gorky, USSR (MD). The study was interrupted in third year due to repatriation to Israel. He obtained his B.Sc. in Medicinal Chemistry from Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel, at 1996. He obtained direct Ph.D. (Summa cum Laude) in pharmacology under supervision of Prof. S. Sasson, School of Pharmacy, Faculty of Medicine, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel at 2003. After then he moved to USA, where he was trained as a post doctorate fellow at University of California, San Francisco & Research Institute of Pacific Medical Center at San Francisco, under supervision of Prof. V. Lingappa. Since 2009, he is a faculty member at Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Israel. From 2011 until 2015 he was served as a Vice-President of Israel Association of Medicinal Chemistry. He was elected as Israeli Representative of the Chemistry and Human Health, Division of International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) for the term 2022–2023. He is also one of the founders of the startup drug development company “AltA-ZuZ”. His research group aims to develop new drug candidates against several devastating human diseases, such as ALS, autoimmune diseases, diabetes type 2 and retinopathies.