Keynote speakers

Darrell Abernethy is head and chair of the Aberystwyth School of Veterinary Science, the first School of its kind in Wales and a joint initiative with the Royal Veterinary College, London. He qualified as a veterinarian from the University of Pretoria, South Africa, before moving to Northern Ireland where he researched animal diseases that impact human and animal health, particularly bovine tuberculosis and bovine brucellosis. His obtained his PhD in veterinary epidemiology from the Royal Veterinary College before returning to the University of Pretoria where he worked as head of department and dean. His diverse research interests, including avian health, rural poverty and zoonotic disease control, are linked by a passion for One Health and multidisciplinary approaches in research, policy and disease control programmes.

Morgan Alexander is Professor of Biomedical Surfaces in the School of Pharmacy at the University of Nottingham.
His research into novel biomaterials involves developing materials for application in healthcare and characterising their relationships between surfaces and the biological response. Understanding these relationships is critical to the development of next generation biomaterials and it is the theme running through his work across a variety of areas spanning control of bacterial and fungal colonisation, immune cell control for implants, stem engineering cell response with applications in medical devices and cell manufacture.
He led a Wellcome Trust funded team that discovered a novel class of bacterial biofilm resistance polymers that are applied on a CE marked catheter that recently became available for a patient in the NHS:
https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/research/groups/biomaterials-discovery/.
Morgan received a Clarivate Highly Cited Award in 2021 and 2022

Nasim Annabi is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Her multidisciplinary research program at UCLA aims to integrate novel chemistries with microscale technologies to develop the next generation of biomaterials for medical applications. In addition, her group has devised innovative strategies for the development of surgical sealants for the repair and sealing of elastic tissues. Her research has been recognized by several awards such as the 2020 NSEF Young Investigator Award of American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), the 2021 Young Investigator Award from the Society for Biomaterials (SFB), and the 2021 Biomaterials Science Lectureship Award from the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC).

Eric A. Appel is an Associate Professor of Materials Science & Engineering at Stanford University. He received his BS in Chemistry and MS in Polymer Science from California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, CA. Eric performed his MS thesis research with Dr Jim Hedrick and Dr Robert Miller on the synthesis of polymers for drug delivery applications at the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, CA. He then obtained his PhD in Chemistry with Prof. Oren A. Scherman at the University of Cambridge. His PhD research focused on the preparation of dynamic and stimuli-responsive supramolecular polymeric materials. For his PhD work, Eric was the recipient of the Jon Weaver PhD prize from the Royal Society of Chemistry and a Graduate Student Award from the Materials Research Society. Upon graduating from Cambridge, he was awarded a National Research Service Award from the NIBIB and a Wellcome Trust Postdoctoral Fellowship to work with Prof. Robert Langer at MIT on the development of supramolecular biomaterials for applications in tissue engineering and drug delivery. Eric’s research at Stanford focuses on the development of biomimetic polymeric materials that can be used as tools to better understand fundamental biological processes and to engineer advanced healthcare solutions. His research has led to more than one hundred publications and 35 pending and granted patents. He has been awarded young faculty awards from the Hellman Foundation, American Diabetes Association, American Cancer Society, and PhRMA Foundation. Eric received the IUPAC Hanwha-TotalEnergies Young Polymer Scientist Award in 2022 and the Society for Biomaterials Young Investigator Award in 2023.

Andrea Banfi directs the Regenerative Angiogenesis research group at the University Hospital of Basel, Switzerland. He previously worked in Genova (Italy) and Stanford (CA, USA). The goal of his group is to promote vascular growth for tissue repair, combining expertise on mesenchymal progenitor cell biology and vascular biology. His research aims at: 1) elucidating the basic mechanisms governing the growth of blood vessels under therapeutically relevant conditions, and 2) translating these concepts into rational regenerative medicine approaches, to restore blood flow in ischemia and to regenerate vascularized tissues, particularly bone. A core competence of the group is to provide controlled signaling microenvironments to progenitor cells through the engineering of factor decorated smart biomaterials.

Mário Barbosa is Emeritus Full Professor at the Abel Salazar Institute of Biomedical Sciences (ICBAS), University of Porto, where he serves as Vice-President of the Strategic Council for One Health initiatives. He coordinates the Microenvironments for new Therapies research group at the Institute for Research and Innovation in Health (i3S) of the University of Porto. The group focus on the functional restoration of tissues through modulation of the inflammatory response, namely though the use of immunomodulatory biomaterials. He was one the founders and the first director of the i3S (2015-2019), the largest health R&D institute in Portugal. Among several awards he received the George Winter Award (2001) and the Klaas de Groot Award (2020) of the ESB. He is the Secretary of the International Union of Societies for Biomaterials Science and Engineering (IUSBSE).

Maartje Bastings is since 2017 appointed at EPFL Lausanne, Switzerland as tenure track assistant professor, heading the Programmable Biomaterials Laboratory (PBL), which is affiliated with both the Institute of Materials and the Interfaculty Bioengineering Institute. She performed her PhD research in the group of prof.dr. E.W. (Bert) Meijer, working on the understanding of multivalent binding mechanisms for directed targeting and the development of dynamic biomaterials for tissue engineering and successfully defended her thesis titled “Dynamic Reciprocity in Bio-Inspired Supramolecular Materials” in September 2012. Her thesis was awarded the University Academic Award (2013) for best university-wide PhD thesis. From 2012 to 2016, Maartje worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Wyss Institute / Harvard University in Boston, USA, broadening her supramolecular self-assembly knowledge by crossing borders to the DNA and cell biology world. She now specializes in the design of DNA-based supramolecular materials that integrate the concept of dynamic reciprocity, a two-way action-reaction process, between soft matter and cells. Over the last 10 years, prof. Bastings has emerged as a specialist in bridging supramolecular materials with cell biology, always taking an engineering approach with a focus on biophysical quantification of interactions.

Dr. Bikramjit Basu is a Professor at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India. He has been pursuing research at the confluence of Materials Science, Biological Science and Medicine. His research group has effectively applied the principles and tools of these disciplines to develop next generation implants and bioengineering solutions to address unmet clinical needs for musculoskeletal, dental, and neurosurgical applications; thereby impacting human healthcare. A Chartered Engineer of the UK, he is an elected Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy (2021), International Union of Societies for Biomaterials Science and Engineering (2020), Indian Academy of Sciences (2020), American Ceramic Society (2019), International Academy of Medical and Biological Engineering (2017), National Academy of Medical Sciences (2017), Indian National Academy of Engineering (2015), Society for Biomaterials & Artificial Organs (2014) and National Academy of Sciences, India (2013). He is a recipient of India’s most prestigious Science and Technology award, Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize (2013) from the Prime Minister of India; and globally competent awards, like Humboldt Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt foundation (2022), and International Richard Brook Award from the European Ceramic Society (2022). He is currently the President (2021-24) of the Society for Biomaterials and Artificial Organs, India, which has more than 900 members across India and overseas and is also serving as the Chair of the Bioceramics Divison of the American Ceramic Society.

Anna Beltzung holds a PhD in chemical engineering with focus on material science from ETH Zurich, Switzerland. During this time, she developed CO2-filters and tracers for microplastics based on polymer nanoparticles. In 2018, she joined Mario Stucki to co-found dimpora AG, a start up producing a new sustainable microporous functional membrane. Since then, she has been focusing on novel materials for the textile industry and works on many of the most pressing challenges in the performance field.

Gianluca Ciardelli graduated in Chemistry in 1994 at the University of Pisa (Italy) and obtained a PhD in Natural  Sciences in 1997 at the ETH in Zurich (Switzerland). He is now Full Professor in Biomedical Engineering and coordinates the “Materials in Bionanotechnology and Biomedical Lab” group at the Dep. of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering of Politecnico di Torino. He has over 20-years’ experience in research in the field of Biomaterials for Tissue Engineering, Controlled Drug Delivery, Nanomedicine. The scopus database reports over 180 articles in peer-reviewed journals, 8 book chapters; 14 patents are cited by espacenet. His h-index is 45 with more than 7900 citations (SCOPUS).

Gianni Ciofani is Senior Researcher Tenured at the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (Italian Institute of Technology, IIT), where he is Principal Investigator of the Smart Bio-Interfaces Research Line and Coordinator of the Center for Materials Interfaces (Pontedera, Italy).
His main research interests concern smart nanomaterials for nanomedicine, complex in vitro models, and biology in altered gravity conditions. He is coordinator or unit leader of several projects; in particular, he was awarded a European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant and two ERC Proof-of-Concept Grant in 2016, 2018, and 2022, respectively. Thanks to grants from the Italian Space Agency (ASI) and the European Space Agency (ESA), he had the opportunity to carry out experiments onboard the International Space Station (ISS) in 2017, 2019, and 2022. In 2018, his real-scale model of the blood-brain barrier was highlighted in the Annual Report on the ERC Activities and Achievements.
Gianni Ciofani is author of about 170 papers on international journals, 3 edited books, and 16 book chapters, and delivered about 60 invited talks/lectures in international contexts. He serves as Reviewer for many funding agencies (including ERC, Swiss National Science Foundation, French National Research Agency, National Science Center of Poland), for about 200 international journals, and as Editorial Board Member of Bioactive Materials, International Journal of Nanomedicine, Journal of Physics: Materials, Nanomedicine UK, Nano Trends, and Scientific Reports; he is Specialty Chief Editor (Nanobiotechnology) for Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology.
Gianni Ciofani is co-founder (2022) and Scientific Advisor of “Kidaria Bioscience SRL”, an IIT spin-off company dedicated to the preparation and characterization of cosmetic and nutraceutical products based on natural-derived active ingredients. He is also co-founder (2021) and member of the executive committee of “ERC in Italy APS”, a non-profit association of ERC awardees born to promote fundamental and frontier research in Italy.

Dr Rodrigo Coutinho de Almeida is currently working at Telespazio Belgium S.R.L for the European Space Agency (ESA) in the Life Sciences team of the SciSpacE program at ESA’s Human and Robotic Exploration (HRE) Programmes Directorate. He obtained his PhD at the Department of Genetics, University of Groningen, working on genome-wide association studies (GWAS) and the non-coding genome. Afterwards, he received the Young Talent Grant Award from the Brazilian Ministry of Education to carry out his postdoctoral research on genomics of complex diseases. Later, he was a postdoc researcher at the Department of Biomedical Data Sciences, Leiden University Medical Center, to explore high dimensional omics datasets in cartilage, bone, and blood from osteoarthritis patients for further patient classification and biomarkers identification. Now, he works on the scientific coordination of SciSpacE research activities in Biology on all mission platforms, such as ground-based facilities, drop towers, parabolic flights, sounding rockets, orbital robotics capsules, and the International Space Station (ISS). Currently, ESA is building a 3D Biosystem (3D incubator and 3D bioprinter) for use in Low-Earth Orbit.

Davies is a Professor emeritus of the University of Toronto (Institute of Biomedical Engineering, and Faculty of Dentistry). He trained as an anatomist and oral surgeon in the UK. His PhD, in solid-state and surface physics, was focused on understanding electron and ion transition events in calcium phosphates. In 1998 Davies was awarded a DSc by the University of London, for his sustained contributions over 20 years to the field of Biomaterials, and is the recipient of the prestigious Clemson Award for Basic Research.
He has published over 200 hundred scientific papers and chapters, and edited 2 books, The Bone-Biomaterial Interface and Bone Engineering – both of which have been heralded as key reference works. He is best known internationally for his work in understanding bone healing around implanted devices.
He is also the founding President, and CEO, of Tissue Regeneration Therapeutics Inc (TRT), a Toronto-based mesenchymal stromal cell company. TRT extracts this population of cells from the perivascular tissue of the human umbilical cord to provide 3 platforms: native and engineered cells and cell lysates.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Laura De Laporte is an Associate Professor in Chemistry Department of the RWTH, Aachen, Germany since she finished her habilitation in the same institute in 2017. Since 2020 she has an additional affiliation to the University Hospital in Aachen. In 2018, she was one of five excellent female researchers who have received funding from the Leibniz Programme for female Professors. She received her PhD with Prof. Lonnie Shea at Northwestern University (Evanston, US) and engineered guiding implants for nerve regeneration. At EPFL (Lausanne, Switzerland), she learned about regenerative hydrogels in Prof. Jeffrey Hubbell’s group during her post-doctoral research. From 2013 to 2018, Laura De Laporte led a junior group at the DWI – Leibniz Institute and was awarded a Starting Grant from the European Research Council in 2015. Laura De Laporte develops biohybrid and bioinspired materials for advanced medical applications, for example to replicate the complex structure of natural tissues. To achieve this, she is working on new synthetic material concepts and new methods of manufacture, combining engineering, chemistry and biology to design biomaterials that control and direct the interaction with cells.

Elisabeth Engel is Full Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC). Prior to this she received her PhD in Medicine from Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB). She started her group ‘Biomaterials for Regenerative Therapies’ at the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) in 2012. Her research is focused on the design and development of biomaterials that modify the tissue microenvironment eliciting a pro-regenerative response.
The research conducted in the last 10 years bring together basic research and a strong effort in transference and translation. The combination of the materials and controlled manufacturing processes has allowed the development of new customized biodegradable systems for different clinical applications such as ophthalmology, nervous system, skin, tendon, bone and cardiac tissue.

Matthias Epple is Professor of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Duisburg-Essen (Germany). He obtained his PhD in 1992 at the Technical University of Braunschweig. After postdoctoral studies at the University of Washington (Seattle, USA) and the Royal Institution (London, UK), he went to the University of Hamburg where he obtained his Habilitation in 1997. He was Professor at the Universities of Augsburg and Bochum before moving to the University of Essen. His research interests comprise the synthesis and biomedical application of inorganic nanoparticles, namely calcium phosphate and noble metals, for gene and drug delivery. Such nanoparticles can be applied to manipulate cells, e.g. to stimulate bone growth, to induce an immune response (vaccination), or to downregulate inflammatory proteins. Matthias Epple is a past President of the German Society for Biomaterials and has published more than 540 papers in international journals.

Lino Ferreira is Coordinator Researcher at Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra, Portugal and vice-director of Associate Laboratory CIBB, the largest biomedical research lab in the center region of Portugal. His research is focus on the development of bioengineering tools to promote regeneration and reset ageing in the cardiovascular system. To achieve this goal his lab uses advanced biomaterials and cell/tissue models derived from iPSCs. He holds a Ph.D. in Biotechnology from the University of Coimbra (Portugal). He did postdoctoral work at INEB (Portugal) and MIT (USA) in the group of Robert Langer in the areas of stem cells and nanotechnologies. He established his research group in 2008 at the University of Coimbra. Since then is the director of the Biomaterials and Stem Cell-Based Therapeutics research group, CNC coordinator of the MIT-Portugal Program and the founder of the biotech company Matera. He is also the associate editor of Biomaterials Science Journal (RSC). In 2012, he was awarded with a prestigious European Research Council starting grant and in 2016 a prestigious ERA Chair position at the University of Coimbra.

Dr. Warren Grayson is a Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. Prior to this, he obtained a PhD at Florida State University and completed his post-doctoral training at Columbia University. He is a pioneer in the field of 3D-printing porous, biodegradable scaffolds, and bioreactor design for personalized, craniofacial bone regeneration. His work received coverage in the New York Times, BBC, and Science Translational Medicine, and has spawned a start-up company. Grayson received the Maryland Academy of Sciences Outstanding Young Engineer award, the Career Development Award from the Orthopaedic Research Society, the Career Enhancement Award from the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research, the Young Investigator Award from the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society, and the prestigious Early Faculty CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation. He was elected as a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biomedical Engineering and recognized by the National Academy of Medicine as an Emerging Leader in Health and Medicine. In 2021 he was named a Daniel Nathans Scientific Innovator by the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

Sei Kwang Hahn is the SeokCheon Chair Professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at POSTECH. He obtained his B.S. (1991), M.S. (1993) and Ph.D. (1996) at KAIST. He did his post-doctoral research with Prof. Allan Hoffman at the University of Washington for 2001-2002. After that, he worked at the Hoffman-La Roche group, Chugai Pharmaceutical Co. in Japan for 2002-2005. Since 2005, he has worked as a professor at POSTECH. He was a visiting professor at Harvard Medical School for 2012-2013 and at Stanford University for 2019-2020. He won the prestigious Song-Gok Science and Technology Award in 2022, the Controlled Release Society Award in 2018, the Minister of Health and Welfare Award in 2017, and the Korean President Award in 2015. He was the Samsung Future Technology Committee, the Presidential Advisory Council on Science and Technology, and is the National Academy of Engineering Korea. He has worked as the editorial board member of ACS Biomaterials Science and Engineering, ACS Applied Bio Materials, Biomacromolecules, the associate editor of Biomaterials Research, and the Guest Editor of APL Materials and Advanced Drug Delivery Reviews.

Roland Kröger graduated in Physics at the University of Hamburg/Germany in 1993 and obtained a PhD on Chemical Vapour Deposition of Diamond Thin Films in 1997 at the Fraunhofer Institute for Thin Films and Surface Technology in Braunschweig/Germany to continue in 1998 as postdoctoral fellow at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa/Israel working on Chemical Vapour Deposited Copper Interconnects supported by a Minerva Stipend. In 2001 he started as research fellow at the University of Bremen/Germany focusing on Electron Microscopy Studies of III-V and II-VI Semiconductors and developed an interest in Biomineralization. In 2007, he stayed for a year at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as Max-Kade Visiting Professor and was appointed Assistant Professor in Physics at the University of York/United Kingdom in 2008 being promoted to Chair in Physics in 2019. Prof. Kröger is Fellow of the Royal Microscopical Society (RMS) and Chair of the Engineering and Physical Sciences section of the RMS and has published more than 120 peer-reviewed papers. His current research focuses on Nano- and Biomaterials, in particular metal-based nanoparticles for biomedical applications and carbonate and phosphate biominerals such as corals, seashells, dental materials and bone using a range of characterisation techniques such as electron microscopy, Raman spectroscopy and synchrotron radiation-based methods both ex situ and in situ.

Roger Kamm is the Green Distinguished Professor of Biological and Mechanical Engineering at MIT, where he has served on the faculty since 1978. His research activities lie at the interface of biology and mechanics, formerly in cell and molecular mechanics, and now in engineered living systems.  Current interests are in developing models of healthy and diseased organ function using microfluidic technologies, with a focus on vascularization in the context of metastatic cancer and neurological diseases.  He is a fellow of the National Academy of Medicine and the National Academy of Engineering. Kamm is co-founder of two companies, Cardiovascular Technologies and AIM Biotech, a manufacturer of microfluidic systems for 3D culture.

Marleen Kamperman is a Professor of Polymer Science at the University of Groningen (UG). Her focus is interested in the biologically inspired synthesis of polymers and nanostructured surfaces with controlled adhesive and mechanical properties. Prior to this She received her PhD in Materials Science & Engineering from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, where she worked in the group of Prof. Wiesner on the development of ordered mesoporous high-temperature ceramics using block copolymers. From 2008 to 2010, she was a postdoctoral researcher in the Functional Surfaces group of Prof. Arzt at INM – Leibniz Institute for New Materials in Saarbrücken, Germany, where she worked on the development of bio-inspired responsive adhesive systems. She started her group ‘Bioinspired Functional Polymers’ at Wageningen University in the Physical Chemistry and Soft Matter department in September 2010. In 2018 she was appointed Full Professor in Polymer Science at the University of Groningen. In the new research group that she established in Groningen she combines her experience in polymer science and material development with the fundamentals of coacervation and bio-inspiration. In 2019, Kamperman was awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant. She wants to use this to develop new materials through environmentally-friendly processes.

Dr. Daniel Kelly is Professor of Tissue Engineering in Trinity College Dublin and Director of the Trinity Centre for Bioengineering (TCBE). He is also one of the founding Principal Investigators of the Advanced Materials and Bioengineering Research (AMBER) centre based in Trinity College Dublin. Kelly is a recipient of the Science Foundation Ireland President of Ireland Young Researcher Award, a Fulbright Visiting Scholar grant (at the Department of Biomedical Engineering in Columbia University, New York) and four ERC awards. His research focuses on developing novel approaches to regenerating damaged and diseased musculoskeletal tissues. He investigates how the physical and chemical properties of a biomaterial, as well as the therapeutic factors it delivers, determines the host response to such an implant. The aim is to develop the next generation of implants targeting specific clinical problems in orthopaedic and cardiovascular medicine. To date he has published over 130 articles in peer-reviewed journals.

Scientia Associate Professor Kris Kilian received B.S. and M.S. degrees in Chemistry from the University of Washington in 1999 and 2003 respectively, and his PhD in Chemistry at the University of New South Wales in 2007. Kris was a NIH postdoctoral fellow at the University of Chicago (2008-2010), Assistant Professor (2011-2017) and Associate Professor (2017-2018) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign before joining UNSW Sydney in 2018. Kris is a recipient of the Cornforth Medal from the Royal Australian Chemical Institute (2008), the NIH Ruth L. Kirchstein National Research Service Award (2008), the National Science Foundation’s CAREER award (2015), a Young Innovator of Cellular and Molecular Bioengineering (2017), the Australian Research Council Future Fellowship (2018), and the Deans award for Excellence in Research (2020). His research interests include the design and development of model extracellular matrices and dynamic hydrogels for cell and tissue engineering.

Prof. Jeroen Leijten is appointed at University Twente as an independent tenure tracker since 2016. He performed his PhD research in the department of prof.dr. Clemens van Blitterswijk, after which he performed postdoctoral research at KU Leuven and Brigham’s Women Hospital / Harvard-MIT. His interdisciplinary research group focuses on the development of nano- and microscale tools using enabling microfluidic technologies to drive the scalable production of multiscale and hierarchically organized bioengineered constructs for biomedical applications and tissue engineering in particular. For his work he received the Jean Leray Award of ESB, and the Robert Brown Award of TERMIS. He was awarded with a Starting Grant of the European Research Council as well as the prestigious Veni and Vidi grants of the Dutch Research Council, and is (leading) partner in various large (inter)national consortia including multiple Perspectief, NWO-XL, and EIC Pathfinder grants.

Michael Levin, a Distinguished Professor in the Biology department at Tufts since 2008, holds the Vannevar Bush endowed Chair and serves as director of the Allen Discovery Center at Tufts and the Tufts Center for Regenerative and Developmental Biology. Recent honors include the Scientist of Vision award and the Distinguished Scholar Award. Prior to college, Michael Levin worked as a software engineer and independent contractor in the field of scientific computing. He attended Tufts University, interested in artificial intelligence and unconventional computation. To explore the algorithms by which the biological world implemented complex adaptive behavior, he got dual B.S. degrees, in Computer Science and in Biology and then received a PhD from Harvard University. He did post-doctoral training at Harvard Medical School (1996-2000) and started his independent laboratory (2000-2007 at Forsyth Institute, Harvard; 2008-present at Tufts University). At the Wyss Institute, he collaborates with Donald Ingber and James Collins on a program focused on development of a highly multiplexed, microfluidic, Xenopus embryo culture system that will enable discovery of new drug targets and development of therapeutics when combined with multi-omics and an integrated bioinformatics pipeline. The team’s initial focus is on development of therapeutics that enhance host tolerance to infections, as part of a DARPA-funded THoR research program.

Riccardo Levato is Associate Professor of Translational Bioengineering and Biomaterials at the Department of Clinical Sciences (Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Utrecht University), and at the Department of Orthopaedics of the University Medical Center Utrecht. He is also Principal Investigator at the Regenerative Medicine Center Utrecht. With his group (https://www.levatolab.eu/team) he focuses on the development of novel biofabrication technologies and biomaterials-based strategies to generate functional engineered tissues, with applications in musculoskeletal and soft tissues (pancreas, liver). Prior to moving to Utrecht, he worked in several research groups across Europe: 3Bs, University of Minho (Portugal); BioMatLab, Technical University of Milan (Italy), Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC, Spain), and he holds a cum laude PhD in Biomedical Engineering from IBEC and from the Technical University of Catalonia. He has been awarded a Starting grant from the European Research Council and a Vidi grant from the Dutch Research Council on the development of a novel volumetric bioprinting technologies for organoid research. Since 2021, he is coordinator of a European consortium (ENLIGHT, European Innovation Council pilot), aiming at developing bioprinted pancreas as model to study treatments for diabetes. To date, he published more than 67 peer-reviewed articles international journals, and he was conferred several awards including the 2016 Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine Young Investigator Award, the 2021 Jean Leray award from the European Society for Biomaterials, and the 2022 Robert Brown award from the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society.

Claudia Loebel, M.D./Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor of Materials Science & Engineering, and Biological Sciences Scholar at the University of Michigan (US). Where she is currently focusing on developing engineered lung alveolar organoids, aiming to build models of acute and chronic pulmonary diseases and for personalized medicine. Loebel obtained her M.D. from Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (Germany) in 2011. In 2016 she obtained her Ph.D. from ETH Zurich (Switzerland), under supervision of Professors Marcy Zenobi-Wong (ETH Zurich) and David Eglin (AO Research Institute Davos). Her postdoctoral research was conducted in the Polymeric Biomaterials Laboratory of Professor Jason Burdick, at University of Pennsylvania, where she was also a Visiting Research Scholar in Professor Robert Mauck’s McKay Orthopaedic Research Laboratory. Loebel was awarded the Pathway to Independence Award (K99/R00) through the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute at NIH for her work on synthetic lung tissue models to probe mechanisms of alveolar epithelial cell dysfunction.

Aline Lueckgen is a senior editor on the biotechnology team at Nature Communications where she handles manuscripts on the topics of tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, drug delivery and biomedical devices. After obtaining her Bachelor’s degree in bioengineering at Rice University in the USA, followed by a Master’s degree in the same field at the EPFL in Switzerland, she completed her PhD at the Technical University in Berlin. In her doctoral work, she investigated the degradation behavior of alginate-based hydrogels for applications in bone regeneration. She looks forward to connecting with the ESB community in Davos.

João F. Mano is a Full Professor at the Chemistry Department of University of Aveiro, Portugal, and vice-director of the Associate Laboratory CICECO – Aveiro Instituto of Materials, where he is directing the COMPASS Research Group . His research interests include the use of advanced biomaterials and cells towards the progress of multidisciplinary concepts to be employed in regenerative and personalised medicine. In particular, he has been applying biomimetic and nano/micro-technology approaches to polymer-based biomaterials and surfaces in order to develop biomedical devices with improved structural and (multi-)functional properties, or in the engineering of microenvironments to control cell behaviour and organization, to be exploited clinically in advanced therapies or in drug screening. He is the Editor-in-Chief of Materials Today Bio (Elsevier). He has been coordinating or involved in many national and European research projects, including 2 Advanced Grants and 3 Proof-of-Concept Grants from the European Research Council. João F. Mano has received different honours and awards, including two honoris causa doctorates (Univ. of Lorraine and Univ. Utrecht) and was elected fellow of the European Academy of Sciences (FEurASc), Biomaterials Science & Engineering (FBSE) and American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (FAIMBE). He was the recipient of the 2020 George Winter Award given by the European Society for Biomaterials.

Prof. Silvia Marchesan did her M. Sci. in Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Trieste (Italy) in 2004 supervised by Prof. T. Da Ros and Prof. M. Prato on C60 functionalization. Her PhD in chemistry at The University of Edinburgh (2008, UK) focused on glycoprotein bio-orthogonal modification. As an Academy of Finland postdoc Fellow, she studied integrins’ pathways involved in cell adhesion at the University of Helsinki (2008-2010). Then, she took a CRSS Fellowship jointly between Australia’s national science agency (CSIRO) and Monash University supervised by Prof. J. S. Forsythe to develop nanomaterials for regenerative medicine (2010-2012). In 2013 she moved to the Center of Excellence for Nanostructured Materials at the University of Trieste (Italy) to develop nanocarbon-based composites and hybrids supervised by Prof. M. Prato. There she opened the Superstructures Lab in 2015 thanks to a starting grant. In 2018, she became associate professor, got habilitated as full professor, and was selected by Nature Index as Rising Star in the natural sciences worldwide. In 2021-2022 (6 months) she has been Visiting Professor at the University of Cambridge (UK) and received the RSC Soft Matter Lectureship (2021).

Michael Monaghan is Associate Professor in Biomedical Engineering at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. His group’s primary research areas are in electroconductive biomaterials, cardiac tissue regeneration, and real-time imaging of extracellular matrix components and metabolism in differentiation and disease. He leads a number of interdiciplinary projects between other academic groups and industry ranging from immunometabolism, evaluation of fibrosis, and induced pluripotent stem cell derivitisation of cardiac organoids. His expertise and knowledge of FLIM microscopy has been recognised through publication of studies in internationally renowned journals, and awarding of a Horizon Europe MSCA-doctoral network worth based on FLIM excellence where he is the lead coordinator. Most recently, he is the 2023 recipient of the TERMIS Robert Brown Early Career Investigator Award.

Prof. Dr. Lorenzo Moroni received his Ph.D. cum laude in 2006 at University of Twente on 3D scaffolds for osteochondral regeneration, for which he was awarded the European doctorate award in Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering from the European Society of Biomaterials (ESB).
Since 2014 he works at Maastricht University, where he is a founding member of the MERLN Institute for Technology-Inspired Regenerative Medicine. In 2016, he became full professor in biofabrication for regenerative medicine. Since 2019, he is chair of the Complex Tissue Regeneration department. He was vice-director of MERLN from 2019 till 2022. Since 2022, he is director of MERLN.
In 2014, he received the Jean Leray award from the ESB and an ERC starting grant. In 2016, he also received the Robert Brown Award from TERMIS. In 2017, he was elected as faculty of the Young Academy of Europe and in the top 100 Italian scientists within 40 worldwide by the European Institute
of Italian Culture.
His research group interests aim at developing biofabrication technologies to generate libraries of 3D scaffolds able to control cell fate, with applications spanning from skeletal to vascular, neural, and organ regeneration. From his research efforts, 3 products have already reached the market.

Antonella Motta is Full Professor of Bioengineering at Department of Industrial Engineering, and Chair of BIOtech Research Center, University of Trento, Italy. Recently awarded as Fellow of TERMIS. The research topics where she gave contributions include biopolymer-based scaffold design for regenerative medicine applications, selection of new organism sources, biopolymers isolation process, in vitro and in vivo biocompatibility evaluations, design of (bio)ink for scaffold fabrication and 3D in vitro models for personalized medicine; in particular, about 30 years’ experience on silk-based matrices for application in tissue engineering such as bone, cartilage, brain, etc. Invited Speaker at several International and National Conferences and Schools. Referee of International Journals in the field of Bioengineering and for international agencies panel for projects evaluations; Coordinator of European projects; Co-Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Biomaterials Science, Polymer Edition.

Prof. Kamal Mustafa is the leader of Center of Translational Oral Research (TOR) and The Tissue Engineering Group at University of Bergen, Norway. His research group aims to address the shortage of tissues available for repair and regeneration (http://www.tissueengineering.no). The scope of the work includes aspects of pre-clinical and clinical biomedical research. He has published more than 200 scientific reports and received several awards.

Prof. Mustafa’s main research activities have been incorporated in the large collaborative EU projects financed by the FP7 and H2020 and several projects financed by national funding agencies. He is currently leading and sponsoring a European multicenter clinical trial to reconstruct alveolar bone using stem cells and biomaterials, which is among few trials in Europe using advanced cell therapy.

Prof. Ovsianikov is a head of the research group 3D Printing and Biofabrication at the TU Wien (Vienna, Austria). He is a member of the Austrian Cluster for Tissue Regeneration (http://www.tissue-regeneration.at) and the board of directors of the international society of biofabrication (https://biofabricationsociety.org). A particular focus of his current research is the development of high-resolution 3D printing technologies and materials for engineering of biomimetic 3D cell culture matrices, realization of novel tissue engineering scaffolds, bioprinting and microfluidic applications (https://www.tuwien.at/en/mwbw/wwwt/pv/3dpb). Dr. Ovsianikov was awarded prestigious ERC Starting Grant in 2012 and an ERC Consolidator Grant in 2017 for projects aimed at these topics. He is also a co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) of a TU Wien spin-off UpNano (https://www.upnano.at), aimed a commercialization of high-resolution 3D printing and Bioprinting, which received multiple awards, including the Austrian Startup of the year 2019.

Raghavendra Palankar is an Associate Editor at Nature Nanotechnology. He is a Biochemical Engineer with a background in material sciences and technologies for single-molecule and single-cell manipulation with multidisciplinary training in basic and translational research.
Within the editorial team of Nature Nanotechnology, he handles a broad cross-section of manuscripts covering nanosensing, nano/micro-robotics, 3D/4D printing, bioelectronics, drug delivery platforms, DNA nanotechnology, synthetic biology that span all areas from nano to macroscales.
He is excited to be part of ESB2023 in Davos, and looking forward to meeting and connecting with the community.

Prof. Elżbieta Pamuła is a full professor in biomaterials science and biomedical engineering at the AGH University of Science and Technology in Kraków, Poland. Currently, she serves as a Vice-Dean for Science at the Faculty of Materials Science and Ceramics and a President of the Polish Society for Biomaterials. With her team, she works on resorbable polymeric and composite scaffolds and matrices for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine, drug delivery systems, especially those administered by inhalation or injection, and in nanomedicine. She has published more than 140 peer-reviewed  papers, 12 book chapters and 9 patents. In 2020 she was elected Fellow Biomaterials Science & Engineering (FBSE).

Dr. Mina Petrovic is currently a postdoctoral researcher in the 3D Printing and Biofabricaiton group  of Prof. Ovsianikov and a is managing an infrastructure project “LifeScope3D” at the TU Wien (Vienna, Austria). She obtained her master’s degree in Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology in 2017 at University of Belgrade, after completing two projects- at Institute Pasteur in Paris and Center for Genomic Regulation in Barcelona. She received a PhD in Molecular Biology at University of Vienna in 2021, in the laboratory of Dr. Daniel Gerlich at the Vienna BioCenter. Her research was funded by the Boehringer Ingelheim Fonds fellowship. The doctoral thesis shed light on molecular mechanisms behind nucleo-cytoplasmic separation during human cell division and yielded two publications in the Nature journal. She started her current position at the TU Wien in 2021, where she is able to pursue her passion for new technologies in bio-imaging, bio-printing and 3D cell culture. Her main area of research follows molecular aspects of cell behaviour in 3D tissue constructs and their interaction with engineered 3D cell culture matrices. Dr. Petrovic is a member of the Austrian Cluster for Tissue Regeneration (https://www.tissue-regeneration.at).

Philip Procter is industry-based, and self-employed in France since 2012. His main interest is in translating biomaterials from the laboratory to clinical use to match unmet clinical needs.
He has co-founded two SME’s for developing adhesive biomaterials, GPBio Ltd, (Ireland 2013) and Biomimetic Innovations Ltd, (Ireland 2020). The latter is currently commercialising OsSticR, a patented, adhesive platform technology, together with two multinational implant companies.
He is an affiliated professor in Prof. Håkan Enqvist’s team (Department of Materials Science and Engineering) at Uppsala University Sweden where he has been directing research into biomimetic biomaterials and tissue adhesives since 2014. Additionally, he mentors a tissue adhesive project in Professor Dominique Pioletti’s team at EPFL in Lausanne, Switzerland. He is qualified as a Chartered Engineer (FIMechE, UK) and Chartered Scientist (FIPEM, UK) and hold a PhD. In Biomedical Engineering, Strathclyde University, Scotland.

Dr. Raimondi is currently listed among the World’s Top 2% Scientists by the Stanford university ranking. She has been awarded 4 frontier research grants by the European Research Council (ERC). Dr. Raimondi is a Mechanical Engineer with a PhD in Bioengineering obtained in 2000 from Politecnico di Milano, Italy. Here, she is a Full Professor in Bioengineering at the Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering “G. Natta”. Dr. Raimondi is the founding Director of the Mechanobiology Lab. She has invented cutting-edge tools for cell modelling, ranging from bioengineered stem cell niches, to organoids-on-chip, to miniaturized imaging chambers implantable in vivo. She is a visiting professor at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Dept. of Pediatrics, Perelman School of Medicine and Dept. of Bioengineering, School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, University of Pennsylvania. Her current research is funded by the European Research Council (ERC), the European Commission (EC) and the National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research (NC3Rs, UK). Her platforms are commercialized by her start-up company, MOAB srl. Dr Raimondi is the founding President of ERC in Italy, the official association of ERC grantees based in Italy.

Professor Rui L. Reis, PhD, DSc, Hon. Causa MD, Hon Causa PhD, FBSE, FTERM, member of NAE, FAIMBE, FEAMBES, is a Full Professor of Tissue Engineering, Regenerative Medicine, Biomaterials and Stem Cells at University of Minho (UMinho), Portugal. He is the Founding Director of the 3B’s Research Group and the Dean/President of the I3Bs – Institute for Biomaterials, Biodegradables and Biomimetics, as well as the Director of the ICVS/3B´s Associate Laboratory, all based at UMinho. He is also the CEO of the European Institute of Excellence on Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine and has been (2015-2018) the Global President of the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS) and the Editor-in-chief of the Journal of Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine (2007-2021). He is presently Associate Editor of PNAS-NEXUS and is in the Editorial Board of several other relevant journals. He is a recognized World expert in the TERM and biomaterials fields, that has edited several books and has more 1710 published works listed on ISI Web of Knowledge with an h index of 108 (1358 works and h=114 in Scopus and 2466 and h=137 in Google Scholar), being also an inventor of around 125 patents. He has more than 1070 publications with more than 10 citations each (i10). Based on those, he co-founded several companies that raised important private investments. According to Google Scholar his work has been cited more than 87500 times. He is listed in the annual Highly Cited Researchers 2022 list from Clarivate (responsible for the ISI Web of Science). This annual list identifies researchers who demonstrated significant influence in their chosen field or fields through the publication of multiple highly cited papers during the last decade. Their names are drawn from the publications that rank in the top 1% by citations for field and publication year in the Web of Science citation index.
He has been awarded many important international prizes, including among several others different innovation awards, the Jean Leray, George Winter and Klaas de Groot Awards (ESB), the Clemson Award for contributions to the literature Award (SFB), the TERMIS-EU contributions to the literature Award and the TERMIS-EU Career Achievement Award, the UNESCO- International Life Sciences Award and the IET A. F. Harvey Engineering Research Prize. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering (USA), FBSE, FTERM, and was awarded 2 honouris causa degrees. He is/has been the PI of projects with a budget totalizing more than 120 MEuros of which around 60 MEuros are U. Minho funding.

Lia Rimondini is Full Professor of Applied Medical Sciences and Technologies and Director of the Department of Health Sciences of the Università del Piemonte Orientale, Novara, Italy.
She is an expert in tissue engineering and in R&D of biomaterials and medical devices with anti-infective properties for regenerative medicine. She integrates technological knowledge with regulatory aspects and clinical practice with particular attention to dentistry and orthopedics. She is principal investigator and coordinator of several international research projects in the above-mentioned topics.

Dr. Makarand V. Risbud is the James J. Maguire Jr. Professor of Spine Research and Director of the Division of Orthopaedic Research at Sidney Kimmel Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University. Dr. Risbud has published more than 160 peer-reviewed papers and has pioneered studies on the adaptation of nucleus pulposus cells to the unique hypoxic and hyperosmolar microenvironmental niche of the intervertebral disc. He serves on the editorial boards of many scientific journals, and on NIH grant review panels. He has served as the Chair of the ORS Spine section and convener of biannual ORS-PSRS International Spine Research Symposia. He is the recipient of the Henry Farfan Award by the North American Spine Society (NASS) for his outstanding contributions to basic spine research and The Professor Fredric Rieders Faculty Prize in Graduate Education by Jefferson College of Life Sciences.

Silvia Scaglione received the Ph.D. in Bioengineering at the University of Genoa (I) in 2005.
In 2004 she was Visiting Scientist at the University Hospital of Basel  (CH). Since 2010 Scaglione is permanent Researcher (Senior researcher since 2021) at National Council of Research (CNR) where she leads a team  of tissue engineeering. She is founder and chief scientist of  React4life, an Italian biotech company that develops organ on chips for medical research, winning several international projects and awards, such as the Innovation Radar award from EU as best Health technology. Scaglione is author of more than 90 international peer-reviewed papers,  book chapters, author of 7 patents. She has been tutor of more than 50  master/PhD students, responsible and reviewer of several  national/international research projects. She is also Ambassador of the European Innovation Council (EIC).

Mark Skylar-Scott is an Assistant Professor of Bioengineering at Stanford, a member of the Basic Science and Engineering Initiative at the Children’s Heart Center and a Chan-Zuckerberg Biohub Investigator. Mark Skylar-Scott received his B.A. and M.Eng. degrees in Engineering at the University of Cambridge in 2007. For his doctoral thesis under the guidance of Prof. M. Fatih Yanik at MIT, he developed multiphoton photopatterning techniques to print full length proteins on 2D surfaces and in 3D scaffolds to probe and direct neural and vascular growth. For his postdoctoral research at Harvard and the Wyss Institute with Prof. Jennifer Lewis, he performed 3D bioprinting of thick and vascularized tissues, and created new high-throughput multimaterial multinozzle 3D printing systems. In 2022, he received the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award towards his goals to develop new 3D printing hardware, wetware, and software to accelerate cardiovascular tissue engineering towards thick, vascularized, and functionally therapeutic organs.

Jess Snedeker is a Full Professor of Orthopedic Biomechanics, with joint faculty chairs at the ETH Zurich (Department of Health Sciences and Technology) and the University of Zurich (Medical Faculty) where he is the Vice Chair for Research in the Department of Orthopedics. Since 2015, he has served as Chief Scientific Officer of the Balgrist Campus, a federally funded center for musculoskeletal research. This national hub hosts more than 20 independent groups comprising more than 220 researchers working onsite. The Snedeker Laboratory is itself a leading research group focused on tendon mechanobiology and regenerative orthopedic surgery. The group has over 150 peer reviewed original publications in print and has received numerous scientific awards for its work. Beyond basic research, the Snedeker group actively develops and translates next-generation orthopedic devices for improved patient outcomes and better quality of life.

Andreas Stavropoulos is Professor of Periodontology at the Dept. of Periodontology, Faculty of Odontology, Malmö University, Sweden. He is registered specialist in Periodontology in Sweden and treats patients at the University Specialty Clinic. He did his postgraduate training in Periodontology and Implant Dentistry at Aarhus University (1996-1999), wherefrom he also received his Ph.D. (2002) and dr. Odont. degree (2011) based on preclinical and clinical studies on regenerative periodontal therapy and in association with dental implants. He was recruited at Malmö University as Professor in 2013. During 2020-2021 he was Professor Ordinarius at the Dept. of Periodontology and Regenerative Dentistry, University Clinics of Dental Medicine (CUMD), University of Geneva, Switzerland, and is adjunct Professor also with the Medical University of Vienna, Austria. He is the President of the European Federation of Periodontology, Councilor of the Periodontal Research Group of the IADR, and Board Member of the International Academy of Periodontology. He is Editorial Board member in several esteemed dental journals, and editor-in-chief in Clinical and Experimental Dental Research.

Anna Tampieri, Chemist, 35 years of experience in Material Science, particularly addressed to biomimetic materials and devices for regeneration of hard tissues and organs.
She authored more than 300 scientific papers published on peer-reviewed Journals and about 20 book chapters (H index = 61  ; citation index : 14.600).
She is inventor of 16 National and International patents, several of which translated to 7 commercial products.
She is Editor of a monography dealing with bio-inspired approaches in regenerative medicine, and Guest Editor of several international scientific journals.
Tutor of 11 Ph.D, 14 M.Sc students, and more than 20 National and International fellowships.
Coordinator of 8 EC-funded Projects, and WP Leader in 6 EC-funded Projects. Coordinator of several national projects. Since 2009 she is member of the “European Technology Platform for Nanomedicine”.
She is Scientific Advisor of European Commission for funding scheme ERC-projects.
Since 2011 is Senior Affiliate Member at the Methodist Hospital Research Institute, Houston, U.S.A.
Associated Professor in Medical Science and Applied Biotecnology, since 2014.
Scientific officer of the company FINCERAMICA Biomedical Solution S.p.A. since 2005.
She was the Idea-maker of the start-up Green-Bone ortho S.p.A since 2014.
Awarded by the TIME Magazine as the 30° research most important in 2009.
Awarded from Massachusetts Institute of Technology Review for disruptive invention in the field of material science for regenerative medicine.

Florian M. Thieringer is Chair and Full Professor for Oral and Cranio-Maxillo-Facial Surgeon and a Medical 3D Expert at the University Hospital Basel (UHBS) and the University of Basel, Switzerland. Besides his clinical expertise in facial trauma, tumor, and reconstructive surgery, he leads the Medical Additive Manufacturing Research Group (Swiss MAM) at the Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Basel, and serves as Co-Director of the multidisciplinary 3D Print Lab at the point-of-care, UHBS. Thieringer is internationally recognized for his work in computer-assisted surgery and medical additive manufacturing. As Co-Principal Investigator of the MIRACLE 2 project, he contributes to developing a robotic endoscope for contact-free bone surgery and patient-specific implants. He is also a board member of the University Hospital Basel flagship project, “Innovation Focus Regenerative Surgery.”

Peter Thomsen, MD, PhD, has a long-term track-record from studying material-tissue interactions in clinical and experimental models. He also has an experience of leading interdisciplinary centres and translational teams, resulting in clinically used bone-anchored oral, orthopaedic, hearing and GBR medical devices. His group´s interests include material-cell and cell-cell communication, involving biodegradable materials, extracellular vesicles, and tissue regeneration. Research involves continuous method development to be able to address also dysregulated and compromized tissues and biointerfaces, e.g. associated with inflammation, infection and irradiation. He has received the George Winter Award, the Erna Ebeling Prize in Medical Technology, International Fellow Biomaterials Science and Engineering (FBSE) and is a member of The Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences.

Prof. Mark Tibbitt joined ETH Zurich as Assistant Professor of Macromolecular Engineering in June 2017. Previously, he was an NIH Postdoctoral Fellow in the laboratory of Prof. Robert Langer in the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He received his B.A. in Integrated Science and Mathematics from Northwestern University, and his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder under the supervision of Prof. Kristi S. Anseth. His research integrates concepts from chemical engineering, synthetic chemistry, materials science, and biology to rationally design and assemble soft matter for biomedical applications. A major recent focus of his research has been on fundamental understanding and applications of dynamic polymer networks.

Sandra Van Vlierberghe has been appointed since 2017 at Ghent University (Belgium) as professor in the Polymer Chemistry & Biomaterials Group (PBM), which is affiliated to the Centre of Macromolecular Chemistry (CMaC) and the Ghent Advanced Therapies and Tissue Engineering (GATE) platform. She executed her PhD research under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Em. Etienne Schacht and defended her work on porous cryogels serving tissue engineering purposes in 2018. She was active as professor at University of Antwerp, was guest professor at University of Lille (France) and she currently also holds a guest professorship at Vrije Universiteit Brussel. In 2017, she received the Jean Leray Award from the European Society for Biomaterials (ESB). Her research targets to establish a polymer-based technological platform covering processing (through deposition- and light-based 3D-printing) and functionalization features sufficiently versatile to potentially address a wide range of tissue engineering challenges by exploiting the unique properties of light. She is ESB and TERMIS-EU council member as well as co-founder and scientific advisor of the spin-off BIO INX which is commercializing ready-to-use polymer-based formulations for 3D-printing. She is also co-founder and scientific advisor of the spin-off 4Tissue which is targeting the clinical translation of novel polymeric biomaterials.

Dr. Tina Vermonden is Professor of Biomaterials for Drug Delivery and Regenerative Medicine at Utrecht University (UU). In the Department of Pharmaceutics, her team focusses on the development of polymeric materials that are suitable as either protein or drug delivery matrices or as scaffolds for regenerative medicine.
She studied Molecular Sciences, and went on to earn her Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Wageningen University, where she worked on supramolecular coordination polymers. After completing her doctoral studies, Dr. Vermonden worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Utrecht University and the University of Minnesota before joining the Dept of Pharmaceutics as staff member at Utrecht University.
She was awarded the prestigious VIDI-grant and Aspasia-grant of Dutch Research Council for research on hydrogels that release drug-loaded micelles followed by a VICI-grant for research on shrinking printing for kidney engineering. Since 2022, she acts as associate editor for the ACS journal Biomacromolecules.

Federico Vozzi is a Researcher at the Istituto di Fisiologia Clinica del CNR (Institute of Clinical Physiology, CNR) in Pisa, where he is the Principal Investigator of the Biomimetic Materials and Biological Tissue Engineering. In 2007, he received a Ph.D. in Drug Science from the University of Pisa. He is the coordinator or unit leader of several projects; he is the Technical Manager of the H2020 ALTERNATIVE project. Dr. Federico Vozzi is the author and co-author of > 100 scientific papers in international journals with peer review, presentations to national and international conferences, and the author of 3 patents. Federico Vozzi is co-founder of “Kirkstall Ltd”, a UK biotechnology company operating within the global organ-on-a-chip market.  His research focuses on tissue engineering for cardiovascular application, 3D-printing and development and testing of bioreactors, and New Approach Methodologies (NAMs) for chemical risk assessment.

Claire Wilhelm, biophysicist, has oriented her research to the biomedical field since obtaining her PhD in 2003 in soft matter physics. This last decade, she used her knowledge of materials science to advance the field of nanomedicine, by adopting the materials angle from the outset. The goal has been to provide the fullest possible picture of the modes of action and fates of (magnetic) nanoparticles in their biological target environments. In doing so, she has worked mostly (i) in biophysics and (ii) in physical chemistry interfacing with therapy. The former has been awarded an ERC consolidator grant in 2014 (MaTissE) and led to the development of magnetic-based methods to manipulate living cells, explore tissue mechanics, and provide magnetic artificial tissue replacements. The latter has also been awarded an ERC consolidator grant in 2019 (NanoBioMade). It was founded on previous works proposing combined cancer solutions by applying multiple stimuli to the same nanoparticle, introducing the use of magnetic nanoparticles as photothermal tools, and developing extracellular vesicles engineering with nanoparticles and drugs as bio-camouflaged vectors. One bridging theme between these two areas of expertise has been whether and how nanoparticles properties can be affected once achieving their therapeutic mission, as they journey within their cellular. Claire Wilhelm was appointed CNRS research director in 2013 and senior research director in 2018. She received the CNRS bronze medal in 2011, the Louis Ancel prize in 2014, and the CNRS silver medal in 2022. She has co-authored 180+ publications (17 000+ citations, h-index 68), 7 patents, and she delivered 60+ invited lectures.

Regine Willumeit-Römer started her career as physicist specialized on ribosomal structure research by neutron and X-ray scattering. After her PhD in physics she habilitated in biochemistry and moved from the ribosome towards membrane active molecules such as peptide antibiotics. This was also the link to become interested in antibacterial implant surfaces and biomaterials as such. To date, as Director of the Institute of Metallic Biomaterials at Helmholtz Center Hereon, Germany and professor at the Faculty of Engineering at Kiel University, she is responsible for the development of degradable Mg-based implant materials. Her research interest range from biomaterials and medical device development in general to the utilisation of in situ technologies to study material degradation and is effect on the tissue regeneration (both, in complex cell culture and in vivo). The most recent focus is on digital implant development which should help to tailor patient specific implants.

Prof. Tim B. F. Woodfield, Ph.D. is Professor of Regenerative Medicine in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery & Musculoskeletal Medicine at the University of Otago, New Zealand. He leads the Christchurch Regenerative Medicine and Tissue Engineering (CReaTE) Group and is Director of the University of Otago Centre for Bioengineering & Nanomedicine. His research platform involves development of novel bioinks and bioresins, biofabrication, spheroid bioassembly and additive manufacturing of medical devices applied to regenerative medicine of cartilage and bone, advanced 3D in vitro tissue culture models, and high throughput screening.
He has published over 170 peer reviewed journal articles, book chapters and published conference proceedings and has received a number of awards and fellowships including a prestigious Rutherford Discovery Fellowship from the Royal Society of New Zealand Te Apärangi and the University of Otago Research Gold Medal. He received the 2020 Research Excellence Award from the Australasian Society for Biomaterials & Tissue Engineering (ASBTE), and was awarded Fellow, Biomaterials Science & Engineering (FBSE) in 2020 by the International Union of Societies in Biomaterials Science and Engineering (IUSBSE).
He has attracted over NZ$28 million in competitive research funding as a Principal or Associate Investigator through grants from the Ministry of Business Innovation & Employment, Royal Society of New Zealand Te Apärangi, New Zealand Health Research Council, AO Foundation, as well as the European Commission (EU-FP7).
He is the current President of the International Society for Biofabrication (ISBF) and former President of the Australasian Society for Biomaterials & Tissue Engineering (ASBTE). He sits on the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society Asia Pacific (TERMIS-AP) Council and on the Executive Editorial Board for Biofabrication. He is also an Editorial Board Member for Advanced Healthcare Materials and APL Bioengineering and Associate Editor for Frontiers in Bioengineering & Biotechnology.

Jie Zheng is a Professor of Chemical, Biomolecular, and Corrosion Engineering at the University of Akron. He earned his PhD from the University of Washington in 2005 and subsequently conducted 2-years postgraduate studies at the National Cancer Institute, NIH. He then joined the University of Akron since 2007. His research lab specializes in the development of advanced bio-inspired, bio-functional, and bio-mimetic soft materials for engineering and biomedical applications by combining machine-learning models, molecular simulations, and bio-related experiments. Zheng has received prestigious accolades throughout his career, including the NSF CAREER Award (2010), 3M Non-Tenure Faculty Award (2008), and Anton Award from the National Resource for Biomedical Supercomputing (2010), and has also been recognized multiple times as Top 2% of researchers worldwide in the field of Chemical Engineering. Zheng is author of 270+ journal papers, with a total citation of 20000+ times and an h-index of 75.

Hala Zreiqat, is a Payne-Scott Professor of biomedical engineering at The University of Sydney. The focus of her lab is on engineering functional synthetic biomaterials for use in regenerative medicine using cutting-edge materials, biological and nano techniques, and novel 3D-printing technologies.
Prof. Zreiqat’s contribution to regenerative medicine and orthopaedic research has led to a number of national and international awards, including being named a Member of the Order of Australia (2019), 2021-2022 Fulbright Senior Scholar; Laureate for the TAKREEM Foundation 2022 “Scientific & Technological Achievement”;  the 2018 New South Wales Premier’s Woman of the Year, the King Abdullah II Order of Distinction of the Second Class (2018), Radcliffe Fellow at Harvard University (2016-2017); Eureka Prize winner for Innovative Use of Technology (2019); and University of Sydney Payne-Scott Professorial Distinction (2019). She is also a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Sciences (2021); the Australian Academy of Technology & Engineering (2020), the International Association of Advanced Materials (2022), the Royal Society of New South Wales (2019); Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences (2019), and the International Orthopaedic Research Society (2019). She is the past president of the Australian & New Zealand Orthopaedic Research Society. She was the Director of the Australian Research Council Training Centre for Innovative BioEngineering (2017-2022) and a National Health and Medical Research Council Senior Research Fellow (2006-2020). She is the Chair of the Council for Australian-Arab Relations (CAAR) (2020-2023); an Associate of the John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University and an Honorary Professor at Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
Prof. Zreiqat has authored over 180 peer-reviewed publications with over 10,000 citations. Her research in the field of musculoskeletal disorders and biomaterials research has led to four awarded and four provisional patents and more than $20.5M in competitive funding, including major grants from the National Health and Medical Research Council, Australian Research Council and the New South Wales Medical Devices Fund.
As well as her pioneering work in biomaterials development, Prof. Zreiqat is committed to improving opportunities for women and young scientists around the world. She is the founder and Chair of the BIOTech Futures, a science and engineering mentorship program for high school students.