Pr JEAN-MARC GAMBAUDO
President of the University Côte dAzur
Coordinator of the Jolnt, ExceItent, and Dynamic lnitiative UCATEDT
Research Director at CNRS
French "Doctorat d'Etat" in Mathematics (tgB7)
My work in mathematics concerns dynamicat systems theory, bifurcation theory, geometry, knot theory, and aperiodic tilings. Ln physics, it is related to nonlinear physics, chaos, statistical mechanics, and quasicrystals. My research activities have been the basis of approximatety 70 publicatlons in internationaljournats and an IBM patent. I have supervised 12 Ph.D students.
Jean-Marc Gambaudo was elected president of the Comue University Côte d'Azur on September 25, 2015. He was the provisional administrator since March 6 of the same year. This director of research at the CNRS was previously Director of the Nonlinear Institute of Nice (UNS / CNRS) since January 2012.
Joined the CNRS in 1984, his research focuses on the theory of dynamic systems. In the 1990s, he took part in the creation of the Nonlinear Institute of Nice and took, for eight years, the responsibility of one of the six teams of the laboratory.
Professor at the University of Burgundy, he created and directs the Institute of Mathematics of Burgundy in Dijon from 2001 to 2004. He develops interactions with industry by becoming a coauthor of an IBM patent and founds the team "Interface of Mathematics "within the Dijon Institute.
In 2006, Jean-Marc Gambaudo was called by the scientific director of the CNRS. He is in charge of the department MPPU (Mathematics, Physics, Planet and Universe) for Mathematics (2006-2007), then Deputy Scientific Director at the Department of Mathematics (MPPU) (2007-2009) and Project Manager with the Director General of the Department of Mathematics. CNRS (2008-2009). He creates the Insmi (Institute of Mathematical Sciences and their interactions).
From 2009 to 2011, Jean-Marc Gambaudo resumed a full-time research activity at the JA Dieudonné laboratory in Nice, then in 2012, he took the direction of the Nonlinear Institute of Nice.
Author of sixty articles in peer-reviewed international journals, holder of the PES (Award of Scientific Excellence) in mathematics in 2010 and physics in 2014, Jean-Marc Gambaudo is also an honorary professor at the university. from Chile.
Pr. PATRICK BAQUE
Prof. Anatomy & Surgeon
Nice, France
He is surgeon, Professor of Anatomy - General Surgery at the CHU in Nice, France. Doctor of medicine in 1998, he did most of his medical studies were at the Faculty of medicine and at the CHU in Nice from hospital student, hospital intern, hospital & practitioner assistant, lecturer. Promoted as University Professor - Hospital practitioner since 2006, he was elected Dean of the Faculty of Medicine of Nice since early 2013.
Pr GUIDO KROEMER, Keynote lecture
Guido Kroemer is a cell biologist who has made contributions to the understanding the role of mirochondria in cell death. He is a member of multiple scientific academies in Europe and is one of the most highly cited authors in cell biology.
Guido Kroemer, Ph.D.
Professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Paris Descartes, Director of the research team "Apoptosis, Cancer and Immunity" of the French Medical Research Council (INSERM), Director of the Metabolomics and Cell Biology platforms of the Gustave Roussy Comprehensive Cancer Center, Deputy Director of the Cordeliers Research Center, and Hospital Practitioner at the Hôpital Européen George Pompidou, Paris, France. He is also a Foreign Adjunct Professor at the Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.
Kroemer completed medical school at the University of Innsbruck in Austria and earned a Ph.D. in biology from the Autonomous University of Madrid. Early in his career, Kroemer worked for the Spanish National Research Council. Now based in France, he is a cell biology researcher with INSERM and a Professor of the Faculty of Medicine of Paris Descartes University. Kroemer first discovered the fact that mitochondrial membrane permeabilization is a concrete step in the process of programmed cell death.
In a publication analysis by the news magazine Lab Times, Kroemer was the most highly cited cell biologist for the period between 2007 and 2013. Three other scientists who had worked at Kroemer's lab were also highly ranked in the analysis. In 2007, Kroemer was elected a member of the Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, the national academy of Germany. The same year, he received the organization's Carus Medal. He was named a fellow of the European Academy of Sciences in 2010. In 2012, he won the Leopold Griffuel Prize from the French ARC Foundation for Cancer Research. Kroemer is the editor-in-chief of the journal Cell Death & Disease.
Pr STEVEN ARTANDI, Keynote lecture
Stanford University, California, USA
Dr. Steven Artandi is a hematologist in Stanford, California and is affiliated with multiple hospitals in the area, including Stanford Health Care-Stanford Hospital and VA Palo Alto Health Care System. He received his medical degree from Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons and has been in practice for more than 20 years. Dr. Artandi accepts several types of health insurance, listed below. He is one of 50 doctors at Stanford Health Care-Stanford Hospital and one of 21 at VA Palo Alto Health Care System who specialize in Hematology.
The Artandi lab is interested in unraveling the molecular and cellular mechanisms according to which telomeres and telomerase modulate stem cell function and carcinogenesis.
Telomeres, the nucleoprotein structures that cap the ends of eukaryotic chromosomes, serve essential roles in preventing checkpoint activation and in maintaining chromosomal stability. Telomeres are composed of G-rich nucleotide repeats bound by a complex array of proteins that help stabilize formation of a looped and protected chromosomal end. Telomeres shorten progressively in humans, both in cultured cells and in certain tissues with advancing age. Telomeres shorten because DNA polymerase cannot fully replicate the lagging strand - the end-replication problem - and because certain stem/progenitor cell compartments express inadequate levels of telomerase, the reverse transcriptase that synthesizes telomeric repeats. Telomerase consists of two essential components: an RNA subunit, TERC, and a protein catalytic subunit, TERT. TERT is a reverse transcriptase that binds TERC and synthesizes telomeres by copying the telomere repeat sequences encoded in the TERC template. Overexpression of TERT in primary human cells is sufficient to extend telomeres and allow unlimited proliferation. In addition to its role in telomere maintenance, TERT can activate resting stem cells through an independent pathway.
Pr BJOERN SCHUMACHER, Keynote lecture
Head of Research Area C – Principal Investigator, Chair for Genome Stability in Ageing and Disease
Prof. Dr. Björn Schumacher’s research group uses the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans to understand the causal role of DNA damage in aging and disease. With increasing age, damage to the genome accumulates and leads to the degeneration of cells and tissues. DNA damage thus plays a causal role in aging-associated diseases. The risk of cancer also increases with age because erroneously repaired DNA leads to mutations that can trigger cancer. Schumacher’s team has identified mechanisms that antagonize the detrimental consequences of DNA damage by maintaining tissue integrity and maximizing lifespan, even when the DNA damage cannot be repaired. The Schumacher group has also shown that DNA damage in individual cells impacts the entire organism. The systemic DNA damage responses are mediated by the immune system and increase the general stress resistance of the tissues throughout the body. These findings are particularly important for understanding progeria, disorders that result in premature aging in childhood. Premature aging is caused by congenital dysfunction of the DNA repair processes. Understanding the mechanisms by which organisms respond to accumulating DNA damage with age is pivotal for developing novel therapies to prevent aging-associated diseases and contribute to optimizing cancer treatment.
Prof. Schumacher’s group has shown that organisms respond to DNA damage by activating genetic mechanisms that prolong life. The focus is on understanding how this response to DNA damage is regulated so that the organism can maximize its survival even if the DNA cannot be repaired. Schumacher’s team has already identified mechanistic links between the ge-netic aging process and the stochastic accumulation of DNA damage. Schumacher and his team have revealed a previously unknown systemic immune response in C. elegans. Their key finding is that an immune response activated in individual cells in response to DNA damage can be transmitted throughout the entire body to promote survival of the organism in the face of further stress. Prof. Bjorn Schumacher has been awarded the Innovation Prize from the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, holds the ERC starting grant and coordinates the European training network “CodeAge” on chronic DNA damage responses in aging.
Pr PATRIZIA ANNA D’ALESSIO
AISA Therapeutics Award Innovative Entrepreneurship Ministry of Research France
University Paris Sud-11 and Biopark Cancer Campus 1 mail Pr Georges Mathé 94807 Villejuif France
Prof. d’Alessio studied Medecine and Hematology at the University of Milan, earned her PhD in Haemorheology from the Utrecht University and worked as professor and researcher in Cell Biology at the Universities of Paris 5 René Descartes and Paris Sud-11. Her work has been focusing on cellular mechanisms of premature cell senescence due to inflammatory stress able to induce and accelerate diseases. These findings and her results constitute the hallmarks of her research.
Following a bio-guided study of over 2000 plant extracts (collaboration ICSN CNRS Gif sur Yvette / University of Hanoi, Vietnam / Academy of Medical Sciences China, Beijin) she identified 4 molecules that fight cellular stress. In 2005, she established the R&D start-up AISA Therapeutics, following the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research Award for Innovative Enterprises.
Since 2015, the AISA Moleculum trademark, resulting from 10 years of preclinical and clinical studies – including the European FP7 Ristomed project – offers a dietary and cosmeceutic supplement to relieve stress and inflammation targeting the growing 65-85 population, but also immune compromized syndromes such as psoriasis.
Prof. d’Alessio has organised several symposia dedicated to the relevance of nutrition for health (IIC) or the importance of biological models (ENS) in the recent history of science. She is co-author of such transdisciplinary books as « Architecture of Life: from Plato to tensegrity » (Brepols, 2007) and « La Sinuosité du Vivant » (Herman, 2012). Invited lecturer at international conferences all over the world, her favorite communications deal with personalized and preventive medicine, as well as the relevance of chronic inflammation for aging and cancer.
Pr ASHOK K. SHETTY.
Professor
Director of Neurosciences, Institute for Regenerative Medicine
Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine, USA
Co-Editor-in-Chief of Aging and Disease
Associate Editor of Frontiers in Epilepsy
Ashok K. Shetty is Director of Neurosciences at the Institute for Regenerative Medicine located in Temple, Texas, and Professor in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Medicine. Dr. Shetty is also Research Career Scientist at the Olin E. Teague Veterans’ Affairs Medical Center, Central Texas Veterans Health Care System in Temple.
From 2004 to 2008, Dr. Shetty served as a Charter Member of the National Institutes of Health Study Section CNNT (Brain Disorders and Clinical Neuroscience ZRG1). He has also served as an ad hoc member of over 25 other NIH study sections, and as a reviewer of grant applications for over 12 international funding agencies from Germany, France, England, Israel, India and Singapore. Presently, Dr. Shetty is a charter member of the NIH Study Section, Developmental Brain Disorders (Brain Disorders and Clinical Neuroscience IRG). Dr. Shetty also serves as an Editorial Board Member of many international journals, which include Stem Cells, Aging Cell, Stem Cells International, Current Aging Science, Frontiers in Neurogenesis, Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, and Stem Cells and Cloning. Dr. Shetty is among the top 1% of scientists worldwide in the field of Neuroscience and Behavior, in terms of citations received for published articles over 10-year period.
Pr HOLLY M. BROWN-BORG
Chester Fritz Distinguished Professor
Department of Pharmacology, Physiology and Therapeutics, University of North Dakota School of Medicine & Health Sciences, North Dakota, USA
Holly is Past-President of the American Aging Association and current Biological Sciences Chair of the Gerontological Society of America. She is also Organizer of the International Symposia on Neurobiology and Neuroendocrinology of Aging, Bregenz, Austria. A popular theory to explain the physiological decline that occurs during aging involves oxidative stress and subsequent damage to DNA, proteins, and lipids. Delaying this decline is associated with extended lifespan. Mice with hereditary dwarfism (Ames dwarf, df/df) and growth hormone (GH) deficiency exhibit delayed aging, living more than a year longer than normal siblings (P<0.0001), differences in antioxidant defense capacity, and lower DNA damage. In contrast, mice with high plasma GH concentrations live half as long as normal, wild type siblings and exhibit a depressed antioxidative defense capacity. The overall hypothesis is that the Ames dwarf mouse has a biologic advantage over normal wild type mice with better enzymatic scavenging of toxic metabolic byproducts and less mitochondrial membrane leakage underlying their enhanced longevity.
Holly’s current studies are designed to further understand the relationship between cellular oxidation, hormones, mitochondrial activities, and aging in a mammalian model of extended lifespan. Determining the pathways and mechanisms that GH utilizes may suggest potential therapeutic interventions that could lead to strategies to delay aging, treat aging-related disorders, and extend lifespan in humans.
She coedited Life-Span Extension: Single-Cell Organisms to Man and coauthored Effects of Growth Hormone and Insulin-Like Growth Factor-1 on Hepatocyte Antioxidative Enzymes, Mitochondrial localization of alpha-synuclein protein in alpha-synuclein overexpressing cells, Growth hormone alters methionine and glutathione metabolism in Ames dwarf mice, Hormonal regulation of longevity in mammals, Association Between Low Birth Weight and Increased Adrenocortical Function in Neonatal Pigs, and Methionine flux to transsulfuration is enhanced in the long living Ames dwarf mouse.
Pr JAMES W. SIMPKINS
Professor
Director, Center for Basic & Translational Stroke Research, West Virginia University, USA,
President of International Society on Aging and Disease.
Dr. James W. Simpkins has served as Chairman of the Department of Pharmacodynamics, Chairman of the Department of Pharmaceutics, Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Studies and Director, Center for the Neurobiology of Aging at the University of Florida since 2004. Dr. Simpkins was appointed as the Frank Duckworth Professor of Drug Discovery at the University of Florida in 1996. He has more than 295 peer-reviewed publications, a dozen patents for his discoveries and has edited two texts on Alzheimer's disease therapy. He also served as the Director of the University of Florida Drug Discovery Group for Alzheimer's disease, which has sustained funding by the National Institute on Aging to support research in the pharmacotherapy for Alzheimer's disease. In 1999 he was appointed to the Medical and Scientific Advisory Council of the National Alzheimer's Association. In July of 2000, he became the Chair of the Department of Pharmacology and Neuroscience and Director, Institute for Aging and Alzheimer's Disease Research at the University of North Texas Health Science at Fort Worth. Dr. Dr. James W. Simpkins is currently the director Center for Basic & Translational Stroke Research, West Virginia University, USA.
Pr ILIA STAMBLER
IEET Affiliate Scholar and Researcher
The Department of Science, Technology and Society, of Bar Ilan University, Israel
Ilia Stambler, PhD, is Chief Science Officer of “Vetek” (Seniority) Association – The Senior Citizens Movement (Israel). He received his PhD at the Department of Science, Technology and Society, Bar Ilan University, Israel. His research has focused on the historical and social implications of aging and life extension research. He is also involved in mathematical modeling of aging and aging-related diseases (https://ec.europa.eu/eip/ageing/ commitments-tracker/a3/quantified-longevity-guide-qlg_en). He is the author of A History of Life-extensionism in the Twentieth Century and Longevity Promotion: Multidisciplinary Perspectives (www.longevityhistory.com). He is actively involved in advocacy for aging and longevity research (www.longevityforall.org), and is chair of the Israeli Longevity Alliance (http://www.longevityisrael.org/) and executive committee member of the International Society on Aging and Disease (http://www.isoad.org/). His papers have appeared in Progress in Neurobiology, Aging and Disease, Cancer Detection and Prevention, Rejuvenation Research, Current Aging Science, Global Aging, Mechanisms of Ageing and Development, Frontiers in Genetics, Geroscience, and other journals.
Pr VINCENT GELI
Deputy Director of the Cancer Research Centre of Marseille, France
Vincent Géli is 1st Class Research Director at the CNRS and currently deputy director of the CRCM, one of the largest Regional Cancer Centre in France. VG has actively participated in 2012 to the new organization of the CRCM with the introduction of genome instability as an integral topic of the CRCM thereby enriching both its research and its application areas to ensure broader understanding, diagnosis and treatment disease.VG initially characterized the budding yeast SET domain protein Set1 and revealed its role in telomeric silencing and DNA repair. He further characterized the organisation of the Set1-complex and determined the roles of its subunits in the regulation of H3K4 methylation. He showed that Set1 represses gene expression by stimulating non-coding transcription. VG also showed that Set1 and H3K4 methylation regulate meiotic replication and double-strand break formation. He answered to a long-standing question about the meiotic loop-axis model by showing that the Set1-C subunit Spp1 by interacting with H3K4me3 and the chromosomal axis protein Mer2 brings potential meiotic DSB sites to the chromosome axis allowing their subsequent cleavage by the nuclease Spo11. In the telomere field, he showed that the ss-DNA binding protein RPA facilitates telomerase action and that processing of telomeres and telomerase recruitment are different at the leading and lagging-strand telomeres. He did pioneer work to characterize the telomeric DNA damage response at eroded telomeres and disclose the relocalization of eroded telomeres to the Nuclear Pore Complex. Recently, he started a study aimed to characterize the mechanisms by which telomere are maintained in quiescent cells.
Pr DMITRY BULAVIN
Group leader,
IRCAN, 06107 Nice Cedex 02 France
Dmitry Bulavin received his MD from the Medical Academy (St. Petersburg, Russia), where he also completed a PhD program in biochemistry and molecular biology. During a postdoc at the NIH, Dr. Bulavin identified a novel role for p38 MAP kinase in negative regulation of tumorigenesis, the direction that is now widely pursued in the cancer field. Subsequently, Dr. Bulavin made important discoveries in establishing the key role of a novel phosphatase Wip1 as a potent human oncogene, this finding catalysed the development of novel anti-cancer drugs by several companies. His academic research is primarily in the field of cancer molecular biology, with particular emphasis on the role of DNA damage and stress response signalling. After becoming fully independent, Dr. Bulavin continued interrogating the role of Wip1 phosphatase and p38 MAP kinase in cancer but also in other pathological conditions as well as during aging. Since 2013, Dr. Bulavin is a full professor at INSERM (France).
Pr GUO-YUAN YANG
Professor
School of Biomedical Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China
Guo-Yuan Yang, MD, PhD, CK Wong endowed Professor of Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Dr. Yang was a professor at University of California San Francisco and was recruited by Shanghai Jiao Tong University in 2008. Dr. Yang is the incumbent associate Dean of Med-X Research Institute, and Director of the Institute of rehabilitation engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Dr. Yang is also serving as a Board member of China Stroke Association; Vice chairman of the Society of Chinese cerebral blood flow and metabolism, CSA; Vice chairman of the translational Neuroscience Committee, Chinese Society of Translational Research Hospital; a Board member of Synchrotron Radiation Committee, the Chinese Society of Physics; and the American Heart Association. Associate director of the Academic Committee of Shanghai Rehabilitation aids with the well-being of the elderly. Dr. Yang is the associate editor of Stroke and Vascular Neurology, Editors of Stroke, Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, Aging and Disease, CNS Neuroscience & Therapeutics, Neural Regeneration Research, Neuroimmunology and Neuroinflammation, Chinese Journal of Cerebrovascular Diseases, Stroke magazine, Chinese modern nerve disease, and guest chief editor of China tissue engineering research and Clinical Rehabilitation. Dr. Yang awarded NIH grants in USA, and many funding from China including the 973 projects, Ministry of science and technology of China, National Natural Science Fund Committee, Shanghai Science and Technology Commission, and Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Has long been engaged in neurobiology, neurology and Neurosurgery, especially cerebral vascular disease of translational research, Dr. Yang published more than 230 scientific papers, the total impact factor (IF) more than 800. Cited references reached more than 10000 times.
Pr SABRINA SACCONI
Neurologist, MD, PhD – University Professor and Hospital Practitioner
Sabrina SACCONI is Professor of Neurology at Nice University Hospital (France), recognized as Reference Center for rare neuromuscular diseases and part of European rare disease network for neuromuscular diseases (ERN NMD).
Pr. SACCONI starts to practice medicine in 1997 at Pavia in Italy and becomes specialist in neurology in 2003. From 2004 to 2008, she begins a European career and constantly improves her competences and understandings on neuromuscular disorder. In 2010, she obtains a PhD in cell physiology and biology with a work on genetic and epigenetic of facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy. In 2012, she obtains an accreditation to supervise research in Nice and becomes full University Professor in 2014 for the Nice UHC.
Since then, she is Head of the department « Peripheral Nervous System and Muscle ». She is also involved in basic research at IRCAN Institute of Research on Cancer and Aging and working on the supplying of several databases on rare neuromuscular diseases.
The main research topic of Prof. Sacconi is the development of new therapeutic strategies to on neuromuscular diseases based on the understanding the role of genetic, epigenetic, endocrine and immune system deregulation in the progression of these diseases.
Pr THIERRY GALLI
Center of Psychiatry and Neurosciences Director
Thierry Galli is a former student of Ecole Normale Supérieure of Saint-Cloud/Lyon. He received his BSc in Biochemistry at the University Pierre and Marie Curie, Paris, in 1988, and his PhD at the Collège de France and the University Pierre and Marie Curie, Paris, in 1992. He then moved to the USA to carry out postdoctoral research in Professor Pietro De Camilli's laboratory at Yale University School of Medicine. There he worked on the molecular mechanism of regulated and constitutive exocytosis. In 1995, he took his first research appointment at the French National Institute of Health (INSERM) and the Curie Institute in the laboratory of Professor Daniel Louvard, and in 2001 he was recruited as Research Director of the French National Institute of Health at the Fer-à-Moulin Institute, Paris. In 2005, he was appointed as a Group Leader at the Jacques Monod Institute, Paris. Since 2015, he is director of the Center of Psychiatry and Neurosciences.
His research focuses on the role of SNARE proteins in exocytosis mediating neuronal cell differentiation, with particular emphasis on the tetanus neurotoxin-sensitive routes, mediated by cellubrevin/VAMP3 and synaptobrevin/VAMP1,2, and the tetanus neurotoxin-insensitive routes mediated by TI-VAMP/VAMP7. His team further found a non-fusogenic role of a SNARE complex comprising ER Sec22b and plasma membrane Syntaxin 1 and is currently studying its function in neuronal development. Recent work includes study of the role of secretory autophagy in both neuronal development and glioblastoma.
Thierry Galli was Editor-in-Chief of Biology of the Cell and is a member of the Factulty of 1000, and the Editorial Board of the Journal of Biological Chemistry and Contact. He is Director of the multi-agency thematic institute institute (ITMO) of Cell Biology, Development and Evolution.