Speakers

Head of Chemistry Department of the Biomedical Sciences Institute Abel Salazar (ICBAS) of the University of Porto, Portugal

Prof. A. Kijjoa is na Emeritus Professor at Instituto de Ciências Biomédicas de Abel Salazar, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal (since 2023).

Born in Pathumthani, Thailand, he obtained his BSc (Pharmacy) from Chulalongkorn University, then he moved to Brazil  with the scholarship from the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Itamaraty) to work for his PhD with Professor Otto R. Gottlieb on Natural Products Chemistry at the University of São Paulo. After his PhD he moved to Portugal and took a position of Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Science, University of Porto. In 1984, he moved to the Biomedical Sciences Institute of Abel Salazar of the same university and in 1985 he spent three months working on Plant Cell Culture with Professor Hans Becker at the Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Heidelberg. In 1986, he won a post-doctoral fellowship from the Ministry of Science and Technology of Portugal to work with Professor Werner Herz in the Department of Chemistry, the Florida State University at Tallahassee, USA. In 1990 he was appointed Associate Professor at the Biomedical Sciences Institute of Abel Salazar (ICBAS), University of Porto and in 1994 he was appointed Professor of Chemistry at the same Institute. Current projects include, among others, antitumor and antifungal activity of bioactive compounds from plants, marine sponges and fungi.

Prof. A. Kijjoa received the Thai Professional Award – In recognition of his outstanding contributions to Science & Technology Development of Thailand by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment; Office of Higher Education; NSTDA and TRF, at the Thai Professionals Conference 2008, Bangkok, Thailand, June 2-4, 2008. He also received na Honorary Doctorate in Chemistry-Burapha University, Thailand, 25 November 2008, na Honorary Doctorate in Chemistry -Kasetsart University, Thailand, 30 July 2009, and na Honorary Doctorate in Pharmaceutical Sciences -Khon Kaen University, Thailand, 07 December 2018.

Dean, School of Pharmacy, Hunan University of Chinese Medicine, Changsha, Hunan, China

Prof. Wei Wang is Yangtze River Scholars Distinguished full Professor selected by the National Hundreds, Thousands of Talents Project "Young and Middle-aged Experts with Outstanding Contributions". Director of TCM and Ethnomedicine Innovation & Development International Laboratory, Deputy Dean of School of Pharmacy, Hunan University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Deputy Director of the Institute of Innovative Medicine. He is also Visiting professor of Karachi University, Macau University of Science and Technology, Wenzhou Medical University, Changchun University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shaanxi University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Southwest University for Nationalities and Hunan Medical College, Consultant of Liuzhou Municipal Government, Guanxi, China.

His research group focus on of the material basis of TCM in Hunan Province, the new method of screening the activity of TCM based on specific target, and the research on the targeted synergistic effect of active components of TCM. Dr. Wei Wang is the principal investigator of over 30 national, provincial and international cooperation scientific research projects, and has developed over than 10 standards about national, industry and enterprise.

He published more than 300 papers, obtained 13 authorized patents and won 7 provincial scientific progress awards, including the First Prize by Hunan Provincial Association of Chinese Medicine & Intergration of Traditional and Western Medicine: Research on the substantial basis and mechanism of anti-rheumatoid arthritis efficacy substances of Tujia medicine Xuetong (2022). He is executive editor of Current Traditional Medicine, chief editor of Current Chinese Science (natural product section), and associate editor of Heliyon (Biochemistry, Molecular and Cell Biology).

Head of Department of Chemistry, University of Aveiro, Portugal

A. Silvestre is a Full Professor and member of CICECO Group 4- Biorefineries, Biobased Materials and Recycling. AS has a lot of experience in coordination and participation in National and EU Projects (40+, 7 ongoing, 2 as PI at University of Aveiro), with 15+ M€ of funding for University of Aveiro. AS published 2 books, 24 book chapters, 21 patents, 417 papers, H-index 73, 19 200+ citations. In the last five years Prof. Silvestre published 134 papers and deposited 17 patents. He is a member of the Editorial board of Industrial Crops and Products (Elsevier); Materials (MDPI) and International Journal of Molecular Sciences (MDPI. He has a large supervision experience, including 17 PostDoctoral students, 43 PhD students (14 finished in the last five years, and 11 in progress) and 50+ MSc students. AS is amongst the UA members classified in Stanford University ranking among the 2% most influential scientists in their respective scientific fields, in 2022 and 2023. His research interests are focused on the Biorefinery concept development, namely through the sustainable extraction and upgrading of added-value compounds from biomass addressing mainly bioactive compounds through the use of benign solvents (using ionic liquids, deep eutectic solvents); new biobased polymers derived from 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid and new functional (nano)composite materials and biomaterials based on biopolymers and cellulose (nano)fibers.

Faculty Pharmacy, University of Porto, Portugal

Prof. B. Oliveira is Full Professor developing research in Food Science, with focus on Food Security. Her research group is concerned in adding value to by-products of food industries, mainly on olive and coffee production chains. She published 425 papers in international peer reviewed journals, 54 book chapters, 210 proceedings in international and national meetings and 1200 communications in scientific meetings. She supervised 22 PhD students from University of Porto and 16 from foreign universities; and 92 MSc from different Master courses. She is author of 4 patents, one of them licenced at industrial level. She won several awards, namely the BFK award in the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Crédito Agrícola 2018, awarded by ANI.

QOPNA & LAQV/REQUIMTE, Department of Chemistry, University of Aveiro, Portugal

Manuel A. Coimbra is Full Professor at the Department of Chemistry of University of Aveiro, Portugal. Graduated in 1985 in Biochemistry at the University of Porto, he got his PhD in Chemistry at the University of Aveiro in 1993, in a collaboration with the Institute of Food Research, in Norwich, UK. He is Professor of Food Chemistry and Biochemistry and Director of the BSc graduation in Biochemistry.
The scientific expertise and interests of Prof. M. A. Coimbra are focused on carbohydrate chemistry, polysaccharide structure and applications, food chemistry, and industry by-products valuation under a circular economy. His research has been based in Aveiro at the Associated Laboratory LAQV/REQUIMTE, allowing to rule over 80 research projects funded by different entities, including industries. He is co-author of 8 patents, 340 research papers, and supervised 28 PhD thesis (+9 running) and 13 Post-Docs.
M. A. Coimbra is Editor in Chief of Elsevier journal Carbohydrate Polymers (IF2022= 11.2), President of the Scientific Panel of Food Additives and Food Chain Contaminants of ASAE, the Portuguese Food Safety Agency, and Former President of the Carbohydrate Group of the Portuguese Society of Chemistry (2001-2003 & 2017-2019) and Member of the Executive Board of the Portuguese Society of Biotechnology (2011-2019).

Advisor to IIM-SLS University in Gujarat, Ex-Vice Chancellor, Delhi Pharmaceutical Sciences & University &The Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, India

CICECO, Department of Chemistry, University of Aveiro

School of Allied Health Sciences, World Union for Herbal Drug Discovery, Walailak University, Thailand