Prof. Georgios Papazisis is a full professor of basic and clinical pharmacology at the Department of Clinical Pharmacology, School of Medicine, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. He is a specialized psychiatrist and has also obtained a Greek Medical Board certification in the medical sub-specialty of clinical pharmacology. Currently, he is the Medical Director of the Clinical Research Unit of the School of Medicine at the Papageorgiou Hospital in Thessaloniki, coordinating early-phase clinical trials. Prof. Papazisis is chairman of the postgraduate program “Vaccines and Infectious Diseases” at the School of Medicine. He serves also as the Chair of the Committee for Bioethics and Medical Ethics of the School of Medicine. Recently, he became a member of the management Board of the Greek National Regulatory Organization for Medicines (ΕΟΦ) and is also a member of the national experts committee of the Hellenic National Public Health Organization. Prof. Papazisis has received several research, teaching, and mentoring awards from Aristotle University.
Georgia Gioula graduated from the Medical School of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in 1994. She was elected as a lecturer in 2005, and since 2016, she has been an associate professor of medical microbiology in the Microbiology Department of the Medical School of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. In 2006, she was trained in the laboratory diagnosis of influenza viruses at Erasmus Medical Centre, Rotterdam. Her main research activities are mostly in the virology area, specifically in respiratory viruses. She has been a member of the WHO and ECDC’s National Influenza Center of N. Greece since 2005. She is also a member of ECDC’s Quality Task Group for Influenza Virus, a member of the GISN (Global Influenza Surveillance Network), and a member of the Community Network of Reference Laboratories for Human Influenza in Europe (CNRL), ECDC, WHO. Since 2017, the National Influenza Center for N. Greece has been the official training center for the detection of influenza viruses in Europe for ECDC, and she is one of the main instructors and trainers of this collaboration. She has also been a member of the National Center for SARS-CoV2 for N. Greece since 2020. This center was one of the first three laboratories in the country that participated in the detection of SARS-CoV-2 in Northern Greece. She is also Head of the Laboratory of Hepatology in the 2nd Department of Internal Medicine at the Medical School of AUTH at the “Hippokratio” Hospital of Thessaloniki.
Pablo A. González is a professor at the Faculty of Biological Sciences, Pontificia Universidad Católica De Chile, Chile, and an investigator at the Millennium Institute on Immunology and Immunotherapy, a center of excellence recognized as such by the Federation of Clinical Immunology Societies (FOCIS). He completed his Ph.D. in molecular genetics and microbiology at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile in 2008 and then performed a post-doctorate in immune evasion by respiratory viruses. He then served as a research associate at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, NY, USA, until 2013, where he worked on microbial genetics. He has participated in the direction of several clinical studies for vaccines, including COVID-19 vaccines during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. At present, his laboratory is mainly focused on the study of immune evasion by herpes simplex viruses (herpes simplex virus type 1, HSV-1, and herpes simplex virus type 2, HSV-2), which infect epithelial cells, neurons, and immune cells with different effects. He has participated in more than 100 scientific publications.
Susan M. Bueno is a professor at Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and a researcher associated with the Millennium Institute on Immunology and Immunotherapy. She earned her Medical technologist degree at the Universidad de Chile in 1999 and her Ph.D. in biomedical sciences at the Universidad de Chile in 2004. Subsequently, she joined as a post-doctoral fellow at Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile in 2004–2007. As part of her training, Prof. Bueno has performed scientific training at Texas A&M University, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and New York University. From March 2007 to November 2013, Prof. Bueno was an assistant professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Biological Sciences, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. In November 2013, Prof. Bueno was promoted to associate professor and currently heads the Laboratory of Microbial Pathogenesis. Her research interests are infectious diseases caused by pathogenic bacteria, host–pathogen interactions, the design of new vaccines against infectious agents, the generation of diagnostic methods for respiratory pathogens, microbial genetics, and lateral gene transfer.
Alexis M. Kalergis is a full professor at the Schools of Biological Sciences and Medicine of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and a doctor of microbiology and immunology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, NY. He conducted two post-doctoral studies at Albert Einstein and Rockefeller University. He has been a visiting professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and the Universities of Nantes (France), Iowa (USA), and Aristotle (Greece). He has participated in more than 400 national and international conferences and published 330 scientific articles. It has trained many young scientists, several of whom hold academic positions and have received awards such as the Avonni National Innovation Award; the Merit Award; the World Intellectual Property Organization Gold Medal; the Abdon Cifuentes Award, which honors scientists with an impact on public policy; the Avonni Award for Innovative Career; and the Image Spirit Award from Chile. He directs the Millennium Institute for Immunology and Immunotherapy, a center of excellence in international translational science. He has participated as an advisor in government and legislative commissions and as a member of the Scientific Advisory Council of the ICGEB (a UN organization) and the Presidential Advisory Council for Science, Technology, Knowledge, and Innovation of Chile. He directed the studies needed to complete the development of a COVID-19 vaccine used for mass vaccination in Chile and other countries.