Gonzales has been professor for 42 years of the Faculty of Sciences and Philosophy of the Peruvian University Cayetano Heredia (1979-2021) with a wide and recognized scientific career at national and international level from 1977 to the present day. Physician and biologist by profession, he is the first Doctor of Science at the Peruvian University Cayetano Heredia (1985) and also holds a PhD in Medicine (1999) with a post-doctorate at Monash University, in Melbourne, Australia (1987-1988). He is an Academic of Number at both the National Academy of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences. During his 44 years of scientific life, he has devoted himself to research on the endocrine aspects of adaptation to high altitude, in particular to the hormonal mechanisms that regulate erythropoiesis. In Peru, residents above 2000m account for 30% of the Peruvian population. Gonzales is the author of 355 scientific publications, including 12 books and 14 book chapters. He has received 72 national and international awards during his scientific career. He is a referee of more than 60 international journals. He has advised 30 Bachelor's, 19 Master's and 8 Doctor´s thesis.

Goswami (PhD University of Calcutta, 1996) is currently a senior professor in the Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, India. Her topic of research is neutrino physics and physics beyond the Standard Model of particle physics. She is a member of the India-Based Neutrino Observatory collaboration. She has received several awards including the Humboldt fellowship from Alexander-von-Humboldt foundation, P. Sheel Memorial Lecture Award for women scientists from the National Academy of Sciences, India (NASI), Allahabad, India, the C .V. Raman Mahila Vijnana Puraskara from Swadeshi Vijnana Andolana, Karnataka, and the J.C. Bose National fellowship of Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), India. She is an elected fellow of all the three science academies in India.

Hutz graduated in biology from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) in 1973 and obtained her PhD in Genetics and Molecular Biology from UFRGS in 1981. She was postdoctoral fellow at the Division of Pediatric Genetics at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine (1982-1983); professor at the Department of Genetics at UFRGS. She was vice-president and president of the Brazilian Society of Genetics. Hutz has more than 270 published articles and an ISI h-index of 40. Her research field and experience is in genetics, with emphasis on human and medical genetics. In 2010, she received the SCOPUS-Brazil award and her PhD students obtained the CAPES Thesis Award by the Brazilian Ministry of Education, and Honorable Mention of same award in 2011 in the area of biological sciences. She was appointed as a member of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences in 2011. Hutz was honored at the 60th Brazilian Congress of Genetics for her relevant contribution to the field. Her research aims to the diversity of the human genome and its effects on susceptibility to multifactorial diseases, and pharmacogenomics mainly of psychiatric disorders and infectious diseases.

Joshi, an internationally acclaimed scientist, was a senior professor in the department of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, before joining Charotar University of Science and Technology (CHARUSAT) as their provost, and founding director for the International Center for Cosmology (ICC). He is regarded as a scholar, physicist, and an expert on cosmology. Joshi’s research interests are general relativity and cosmology. He has made fundamental contributions in black hole physics and gravitation theory. His extensive analysis of general relativistic gravitational collapse has been widely recognized as providing significant insights into final fate of massive collapsing stars in the universe, formation of space-time singularities, and cosmic censorship. His research which mainly revolves around Cosmology and Gravitation Physics, has been reported in more than 200 research papers in international journals of repute, and also in monographs from Oxford University Press (OUP), Cambridge University Press (CUP) and other books on the subject. He has held visiting faculty positions in several countries doing research, lecturing on these topic.

Karunaweera is the chair, senior professor of parasitology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka and honorary visiting fellow at the School of Public Health, Harvard University, USA. Trained as a medical parasitologist she has extensive teaching and research experience in tropical diseases, with special emphases on vector-borne diseases. Elected Fellow of National Academy of Sciences of Sri Lanka, she is the first Sri Lankan elected as an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and as a Distinguished International Fellow of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. She received several research grant awards, both international and local, including Tropical Medicine Research Centre Award, by National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institute of Health, US. Fellowship awards received include Harvard University’s Senior Research Scholar Award (2005/6); Fulbright Advanced Research and Lecturing Award (2005). She is the founder president of Sri Lanka National Chapter of Organization for Women in Science for the Developing World (OWSD) and current president of Sri Lanka College of Microbiologists.

Mamun obtained his BSc (Honours) and MSc (Thesis) from Jahangirnagar University, and secured 1st class 1st position in both the examinations. He received his PhD degree from the University of St. Andrews (UK) under the Commonwealth Scholarship. Mamun was awarded the Alexander von Humboldt (AvH) Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship (Germany), the Commonwealth Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship (UK), the Max Planck Research Fellowship (Germany), among others. Mamun received the AvH the Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award in 2009. He was awarded the Bangladesh Academy of Sciences Gold Medal in 2004, the TWAS Prizes for Young Scientists in Developing Countries in 2006, among other recognitions. He has published over 400 research articles in peer-reviewed international journals, and has written a textbook published by the Institute of Physics (London).

BSc from University College Dublin (1987), MSc from University of Edinburgh (1988), and PhD from University of Oxford (1991), received a post-doctorate scholarship at the University of Sydney (2002). She is a full professor of Universidade de Brasilia and a CNPq scholarship holder (1A). She has experience in animal genetics and breeding, in conservation of animal genetic resources and landscape genetics. McManus has published more than 500 articles in peer-reviewed journals with the editorial board, 24 book chapters, more than 550 abstracts in conferences, and supervised more than 200 students. She participates in joint projects at the United States Department of Agriculture and the Agricultural Research Council of South Africa, among others. She is a reviewer for 38 national and international journals, and 11 development agencies, as well as associate editor for Tropical Animal Health and Production. She was the director of international affairs for CAPES/Ministry of Education, Brazil. McManus is a Brazilian Academy of Science member and commander of the National Order of Scientific Merit. Currently, is responsible for research collaboration in FAPESP/São Paulo/Brazil.

Musoke (MBChB, PhD) is a professor, pediatric infectious diseases specialist in the department of Paediatrics and Child Health, Makerere University, and has carried out research with the Makerere University-Johns Hopkins University research collaboration since 1995. She has conducted multiple perinatal HIV prevention clinical trials with US National Institute of Health Division of AIDS network (HIVNET/HPTN/IMPAACT), including the landmark HIVNET012 (Ugandan vice-chair), single dose nevirapine (NVP) to mother and infant for prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of HIV, which have informed WHO guidelines for PMTCT. She has also conducted pediatric HIV treatment clinical trials to improve antiretroviral therapy for children in resource-limited settings, and pediatric TB diagnostics and treatment. In 1999, she received the Recognition Award, for outstanding contributions to advancing the prevention of perinatal HIV transmission, Canada, and in 2017 the National Bioethics Award, Uganda National Council for Science and Technology, Uganda. Musoke is a fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, and in 2016 she was appointed fellow of the Uganda Academy of Sciences.

Paz got his PhD from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA), Argentina, and held a postdoctoral position both at the Universtity of Maryland and at the Los Alamos National Lab (LANL), United States, where he was also a staff member. He is a leader in quantum information. He made major contribution to the theory of quantum open systems and to the study of the process of decoherence. He contributed to the theory of quantum error correction and to design new quantum algorithms for physics simulations. He played a key role to establish a strong experimental basis for quantum technologies in Argentina. As a director of the Physics Department of UBA he played a key role to position it as a leading institution in the region. He is plenary full professor at UBA, superior investigator at CONICET and since December 2019 has been the vice-minister of Science in Argentina. Paz received the 2015 Argentinian Presidential Prize in Science, the TWAS Prize in Physics, a Guggenheim Fellowship, the W. Bessel Prize; and the Bunge and Born, and Konex prizes in Argentina.

Poveda (PhD, 1998, Water Resources) is full Professor, Universidad Nacional de Colombia at Medellín, Colombia. Member of: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Academies of Sciences of Colombia and Spain. Scientific steering committees: Global Energy and Water Cycles Research Program of the Global Climate Research Program, Scientific Panel for the Amazon, Global Change and Human Health Program. He was part of the 2019 International Mission of Experts convened by the Colombian government to develop the road map for science, education and technology in Colombia for the XXI century. He has been elected as visiting fellow at: Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado, Boulder, USA (2001-2002), Centre for Hydrology and Ecology, Wallingford, UK (2005), National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado (2010 and 2019), and Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena, Germany (2019). He is the author and co-author of 9 books, and more than 200 peer-reviewed papers published on hydrology, meteorology, oceanography, hydroclimatology, climate change, human health and water resources engineering.

Raqib, received her MSc degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Dhaka University and her degree of Doctor of Philosophy, Faculty of Medicine from Karolinska Institute, Sweden (1990-1995). She then returned to Bangladesh in 1995, to join as assistant scientist the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b), where she was promoted associate scientist and then scientist in 2002 and 2006, respectively. Raqib received post-doctoral fellowship award from the Ellison Medical Foundation in 2005. She was appointed as the head of the Nutritional Biochemistry Lab in 2008 and was promoted to senior scientist in 2010, and to international senior scientist the next year. Raqib developed an immunological method to diagnose active tuberculosis which was patented in the USA (co-inventor David Sack). Her work on host directed therapy in infectious diseases with Agerberth and Guðmundsson generated first human data of successful clinical recovery, leading to two patents. Her studies on arsenic-mediated immune modulation generated new human data. She has published over 153 peer reviewed articles and mentored several MSc, PhD and post-doctoral students.

Ratsimbazafy (PhD, 2002, State University of New York, USA and French Habilitation, 2011, University Antananarivo, Madagascar) is a faculty lecturer at the University of Antananarivo. He has published over 200 research papers, review articles and book chapters. Furthermore, he is the co-vice chair, Madagascar section, International Union for Conservation of Nature, Species Survival Commission (IUCN/SSC) Primate Specialist Group; the director of Houston Zoo, Madagascar Program; and the president of the Madagascar Primate Research Group. Additionally, he is a member of Malagasy Academia and African Academy of Sciences. He has won many international awards and prizes such as: the Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship (1998); the Galante Award (2002) of the International Primatological Society; and the Disney’s Hero Conservation Award (2015). Recently, he received from the Council of the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation (ATBC) the Lifetime Honorary Fellow 2019, which is the highest honor awarded by ATBC. He also received the African Primatological Society Award 2019. In February 2020, he was elected the president of the International Primatological Society.

Sanginga has been director general of the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) since 2011. He has more than 35 years of experience in international agricultural research and development, research administration and management, and resource mobilization, particularly in the fields of applied microbial ecology, plant nutrition, and integrated natural resources management in Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia. Before joining IITA, he was director of the Nairobi-based Tropical Soil Biology and Fertility Institute of the Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT-TBSF, 2003-2011). His career has focused on mentoring and capacity building of young scientists, entrepreneurship, and agriculture/agribusiness in Africa. He has published more than 120 research articles in peer-reviewed international journals and was honored with the International Foundation for Science Sven Brohult Award for his contribution to agricultural and agroforestry research. Born in DR Congo (DRC), Sanginga did most of his postgraduate training at IITA and his PhD in Agronomy/Soil Microbiology under a joint program in DRC, Burundi, and Rwanda. Under his leadership, IITA has tran

Sayed is dean of engineering, École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland. He has served as distinguished professor and chairman of electrical engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) where he founded the Adaptive Systems Laboratory (1996). Recognized as a highly cited researcher and a member of the US National Academy of Engineering, he served as president of the IEEE Signal Processing Society (SPS) in 2018-19. An author of over 570 scholarly publications and six books, his research involves several areas including adaptation and learning theories, data and network sciences, statistical inference, and multi-agent systems. His awards include: 2020 Norbert Wiener Society Award, 2015 Education Award from IEEE-SPS; 2014 Papoulis Award from European Association for Signal Processing; 2013 Meritorious Service Award and 2012 Technical Achievement Award from IEEE-SPS, 2005 Terman Award from American Society for Engineering Education, 2003 Kuwait Prize, and several Best Paper awards from scientific organizations. He is a fellow of IEEE, European Association for Signal Processing (EURASIP), and American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

Seraj has been teaching molecular biology and working on ways for producing salt tolerant rice for Bangladesh using molecular biological and biotechnological approaches. She helped fine-map salt tolerant loci from Pokkali for introgression in a marker-assisted backcrossing approach into commercial rice. She has characterized many Bangladeshi rice landraces as salt tolerant and elucidated the mechanism of Horkuch, whose loci have been introgressed into commercial rice using fluorescent markers. She is working on the only halophyte which can set rice-like grains and which is endemic to the whole coastline of Bangladesh. Several genes from this Oryza coarctata have been cloned into salt sensitive rice. She is doing genome editing of commercial rice to increase photosynthetic efficiency and increase salt tolerance. She has established tissue culture independent transformation in rice. She is the founder director of a center under Dhaka University for conduction of online bioinformatics classes from January 2017. She has supervised 11 PhD students and over 70 Masters students. She has organized many conferences and workshops in Molecular Biology. She has been appointed as UGC Professor.

Shaabani (PhD, 1994, Tarbiat Modarres University, Tehran, Iran) is full professor, Shahid Beheshti University (SBU), a member of Academy of Sciences, Islamic Republic of Iran, and past-president of SBU. His prizes include Distinguished Professor of the Iran Universities selected by the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology of Iran; Distinguished Professor selected by Iran's National Elites Foundation, (first edition of Allameh Tabatabaei Award); Prize of the International Kharazmi Festival in Basic Science; and Iranian Chemical Society’s Distinguished Chemist. Shaabani’s main expertise is the discovery and design of novel isocyanide-based multi-component reactions ( I-MCRs) in the synthesis of biologically important heterocyclic compounds, preparation of neoteric functional materials with functionalization/modified nano-materials and natural polymers via I-MCRs and applied in drug delivery and materials biomedical platform. He has published more than 350 publications including several review articles and book chapters and more than 100 presentations in conferences.

Shabani (PhD, 1986, Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium) is professor of mathematics and mathematical physics, University of Burundi (UB); president, Burundi Academy of Sciences; past vice-president, African Academy of Sciences and African Mathematical Union. He is president of the Burundi National Commission for higher education; and director of the University of Burundi Doctoral School. He was director of the UNESCO Harare Cluster Office and representative to several African countries and regional economic commissions. He was vice-rector of UB; deputy secretary general of the Association of African Universities. He is president of the International Advisory Board of the Africa Centre of Excellence on Innovative and Transformative STEM Education at Lagos State University, Nigeria (funded by the World Bank); president of the International Conference on Quality Assurance in Higher Education in Africa; member of the Executive Committee of the Global University Network for Innovation, Barcelona, Spain; member of the High Level Panel of the Pan African University; coordinator of the African Union quality assurance cluster; member of African Academy of Sciences.

Stashenko is the director of the National Research Center for the Agroindustrialization of Tropical Medicinal and Aromatic Plants, CENIVAM. She has directed the research work of more than 300 new professionals in Chemistry, at undergraduate and graduate levels, which have been the basis for her publication of over 250 scientific articles. She has coauthored 11 patents. Research topics include the application of chromatographic and mass spectrometric techniques to the study of secondary metabolites from aromatic plants, to the determination of pesticide residues in various materials, and to petrochemistry and organic geochemistry. Stashenko founded the National School on Chromatography where she has taught over 150 specialized courses on separation sciences to practicing professionals from research labs and industry.

Whitelock is an astronomer at, and former director of, the South African Astronomical Observatory and an honorary professor at the University of Cape Town. She obtained her BSc and PhD at the University of London. Her primary research interests are the late stages of stellar evolution, mass-loss and variability. She has also worked on galactic structure, near-by galaxies and the cosmic distance scale. She is involved in astronomy education, astronomy for development, and international coordination and collaboration. She has served as president of the International Astronomical Union’s Division VII (Galactic Systems), is a member of the Academy of Sciences of South Africa, an honorary fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society (UK) and an honorary member and fellow—and former president—of the South African Institute of Physics (SAIP). She is the recipient of the 2018 de Beers Gold Medal of the SAIP and a Doctor of Laws (HC) from Rhodes University in 2020. She is currently Chair of the South African LSST Committee, which oversees collaborations with the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, and serves on the Executive Committee of the African Astronomical Society (AfAS) 2025-2028.

Yang received his PhD degree in 1993 from the University of California, Davis, United States. After a post-doctoral fellowship at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, he joined the City University of Hong Kong in 1994 and was promoted to chair professor of mathematics in 2007. He was the president of Hong Kong Mathematical Society (2016-2020). Yang is a member of the European Academy of Sciences, Hong Kong Academy of Sciences, and a foreign member of Academia Europaea. He is also a fellow of American Mathematical Society.

Zhao is a chair professor at University of Hong Kong (HKU), and a Changjiang chair professor at Northwest University, China. He earned BSc and MSc from Jilin University in 1985 and 1988, respectively, and a PhD from Curtin University in 2000. Zhao’s research fields are metamorphic petrology, Precambrian geology and supercontinents. He has published 460 papers, cited for 64,814 times (h-index 137). Zhao has received many awards and honors, including State Natural Science Award (Second Class, 2014), Highly Cited Researchers (2014-2022), 29th Khwarizmi International Award (First Class; 2016), Chair Professorship of Changjiang Scholars Program (2017), and TWAS Prize in Earth, Astronomy and Space Sciences (2018). He is a fellow of the Geological Society of America (2014), a Member (Academician) of the Chinese Academy of Science (2019), Fellow (Academician) of The World Academy of Science for the Advancement of Science in Developing Countries (2020), and HKU Distinguished Research Achievement Awards (2021). He was the Editor-in-Chief of Precambrian Research (2010-2021) In the 2023 Best Scientists Ranking (Research.com), he stands No.10 in the world and No.1 in China in earth sciences.

Zhu, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), professor of biogeochemistry, microbial ecology and environmental soil science, is the Director General of the Research Centre for Eco-environmental Sciences, CAS. Zhu is a leader in taking multi-scale and multi-disciplinary approaches to soil and environmental problems. He obtained his PhD in environmental biology from Imperial College, London in 1998. He is currently the co-editor-in-chief of Environment International (Elsevier), founding editor of Soil Ecology Letters, and an editorial member for a few other international journals. He is a scientific committee member for the International Science Council (ISC) programme on Human Health and Wellbeing in Changing Urban Environment, and served for nine years as a member of the Standing Advisory Group for Nuclear Application, International Atomic Energy Agency (2004-2012). Zhu is the recipient of many merit awards, among them including the TWAS Prize in Agricultural Science 2013, and the National Natural Science Award 2009 and 2023. Zhu has published over 700 papers in international journals. He is an ISI highly cited researcher since 2016

Zhu received B.Eng. degree from Zhejiang University in 1982 and PhD degree from McMaster University, Canada, in 1991. He joined Department of Chemical Engineering at McMaster University as a faculty member in 1994 and served as department chair from 2009 to 2014. He has served as a vice-president of The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen since 2017. Zhu works on polymer reaction engineering and materials, advanced polyolefin products, and smart polymers. He has trained 140 graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, published 378 papers, received 13900 SCI citations, given 300 invited seminars. He was elected to Canada Research Chair in 2001, as a fellow to Chemical Institute of Canada in 2009, to Canadian Academy of Engineering in 2010, to Engineering Institute of Canada in 2011, and to Royal Society of Canada in 2014. He was bestowed the highest honor Distinguished University Professor by McMaster University in 2015 and awarded the primary R.S. Jane Memorial Award by Canadian Society of Chemical Engineering in 2016. He is a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of several academic publications. He is an active consultant for polymer industries.

Zhu (PhD, 1999, Donghua University), member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, is currently the director of the State Key Laboratory for Modification of Chemical Fibers and Polymer Materials at Donghua University. She has served as the vice-president for Chinese Materials Research Society (C-MRS) since 2016 and the Chinese Association of Women Scientific Workers since 2019. She is recognized as a pioneer in the discovery and development of melt spinning process theory of polymer-based nanocomposite fibers in China. She published over 600 SCI papers, 10 books and chapters. Over 300 Chinese Invention Patents were filed and granted. Her honors and awards include Second Prize of National Award for Technological Inventions (2020), National Innovation Competition Award (2017), First Prize of Shanghai Natural Science Award (2018), First Prize of Shanghai Award for Technological Invention (2015), the Cheung Kong Scholars (2013), Shanghai Science and Technology Elite (2011), Second Prize of National Award for Progress in Science and Technology (2006).

Baharvand (PhD, 2004, Khwarizmi University) is a Professor, Founder, and Director of Royan Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Technology, Tehran, Iran. His prizes include Mustafa Prize, TWAS Prize in Biology, UNESCO-Equatorial Guinea International Prize, Islamic Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (ISESCO) Prize in Biology, three Razi Research Awards from Iran Ministry of Health and Medical Education, two Khwarizmi International Awards from Iran Ministry of Science, Research and Technology, two Dr. Hadavi’s Awards from Academy of Medical Sciences of Iran, Prominent Professor in 3rd term of Allameh Tabatabaei’s Award from Iran Vice Presidency for Science and Technology and National Elite Foundation, etc. He is a member of the International Society for Stem Cell Research, the International Society for Cell and Gene Therapy, International Society for Extracellular Vesicles. He is currently the editorial board member of eight international journals (e.g., Journal of Biological Chemistry and Scientific Reports from Nature Publishing Group).

Bandyopadhyay completed her BTech and MTech in Computer Science from Calcutta University and IIT Kharagpur, respectively. She joined the Indian Statistical Institute as a faculty member after completing her PhD from the same Institute. She was the Director of the Institute for two terms: 2015-2020 and 2020-2025. She currently continues as a Professor at the Institute. Her areas of research interest include computational biology and Bioinformatics, soft and evolutionary computation, data mining and machine learning. She has received several awards and fellowships, including the Bhatnagar Prize, Infosys award, TWAS Prize, IAPR Maria Petrou Prize, DBT National Women Bioscientist Award (Young), Young scientist/engineer medals of INSA, INAE and Science Congress, JC Bose Fellowship, Swarnajayanti Fellowship and Humboldt Fellowship. She is a Fellow of the all the major Indian science academies and the Engineering academy, and of IEEE, TWAS and IAPR. In 2022, she received the Padma Shri, the fourth highest civilian award of the Government of India. She is currently a member of the Science, Technology and Innovation Advisory Council of the Prime Minister of India.

Biekpe is currently Professor of Development Finance and Econometrics, and Program Director of the MCom in Development Finance at the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business. He is also President of Africagrowth Institute and Executive Chairman of the Chartered Institute of Development Finance. He has an MSc in Applied Statistics and Operational Research (London) and PhD in International Finance (Queens, UK). Biekpe is a Chartered Statistician and Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society of Great Britain and a Chartered Scientist of the Science Council of the United Kingdom. He is the Executive Editor of the African Finance Journal, Executive Editor of Review of Development Finance and Managing Editor Africagrowth Agenda Journal and Managing Editor of the Development Finance Agenda Magazine. Biekpe is a member of the Academy of Sciences of South Africa (ASSAf), a Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences (FAAS) and a Fellow of Royal Society of Arts (FRSA).

Chaudhary is an Emeritus Professor at Tribhuvan University (TU), Kirtipur, Nepal. He has 48 years experience in teaching, research and academic administration. He was Executive Director of one of TU research institutes; served as a member of the National Planning Commission of Nepal; Chair of the Board of Governors of the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development; Trustee of the National Trust for Nature Conservation; team leader of national, regional (Bhutan, China, India, Nepal) and international (Italy, Norway, USA) academic programmes. He contributed to policy formulation for the Government of Nepal in the fields of biodiversity and environment; widely travelled on foot in mountains of Hindu Kush Himalaya; visited 10 major herbaria (France, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Russian Federation, UK, USA); received 28 awards and medals; led 28 research projects; supervised five PhD and over 60 Master’s theses. He also established in his name a Gold Medal Award at TU, and a science scholarship in a secondary school in the village where he was born and received his primary education. A new plant species from Nepal, the Saussurea ramchaudharyi (Asteraceae), was named after him.

Chen is a professor of Physics at University of Science and Technology of China, where he received his PhD in 1992. He is also an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the director of the Key Laboratory of Strongly Coupled Quantum Materials of Chinese Academy of Sciences. His research is focused on high-temperature superconductors, strongly correlated electronic materials and other quantum materials. He has received several distinguished awards, including the First Prize of State Natural Science Award of China, the Bernd T. Matthias Prize in International Superconducting Materials and TWAS Prize in Physics. He has been an Advisory Board of Solid State Communications and Science Bulletin, and an associate editor of Science China Materials.

Deen is Dist. University Professor, Dr. Haykin Distinguished Engineering Professor, and Director of the Micro- and Nano-Systems Lab at McMaster University. An acclaimed educator, winner of the IEEE EDS SM Sze Education Award, received the IEEE Canada Ham Education Medal, McMaster President's Award for Excellence in Graduate Supervision, and MSU Macademics’ Lifetime Achievement Award. Served as President of the Academy of Science, RSC (2015–2017), and inaugural Vice President (North) of TWAS (2023-2026). Research spans nanoelectronics, optoelectronics, nanotechnology, and data analytics for health and environmental applications. Authored 970+ peer-reviewed articles, 3 textbooks, and holds 13 patents-7 used widely in industry. Many honors include the ECS Callinan and Electronics & Photonics Awards, Humboldt Research Award, RSC Eadie Medal, IEEE Canada's McNaughton Gold Medal, Fessenden Silver Medal, Gotlieb Computer Award, and EIC Julian C. Smith Medal. Holds 5 hon. doctorates. Elected to 14 academies/societies, including RSC, Chinese Academy of Sciences, NASI, CAE, AAS, APS, and ECS, also a Member of the Order of Canada, the nation's highest civilian honor.

Erra-Balsells (PhD, 1979, University of Buenos Aires, UBA, Argentina) is consultant full professor, Departemento de Quimica Organica, Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, UBA and visiting prof. Faculty of Agriculture, Ehime University, Japan, and investigator (superior), Argentine National Research Council. She is member of the IMSF office board, representative of Central and South America. She was: vice-president and president, Argentine Society of Mass Spectrometry; secretary, vice-president and president, Argentine Organic Chemistry Society; editor and editor-in-chief, Journal of the Argentine Chemical Society (AQA). Her awards and honors include: AQA, Dr. P.A. Berdoy prize; AQA, Dr. L.C. Guglialmelli prize; Institute of Ibero-American Culture & Ministry of Education of Spain; V Centenary 1492-1992 Award; Japan Society for Promotion of Sciences, international research fellow; Konex foundation (Argentina) Konex Diploma in Organic Chemistry. She is fellow of the Latino-american Academy of Sciences (ACAL). Research interests: chemistry and photochemistry of MALDI matrices. Design of new MALDI matrices for biosystems analysis. Intact single cell MS analysis, at real time.

Specializing in metabolomics, natural products chemistry, and plant biochemistry, Farag completed his PhD at Texas Tech University, USA, in 2003. In 2005, after spending time as a postdoctoral fellow at The Samuel Noble Foundation, USA, and the James Graham Brown Cancer Center, USA, he became assistant professor in 2005 at the Faculty of Pharmacy, Cairo University, Egypt. Since 2009, Farag has been working as a part time visiting professor at the Technical University of Munich, Germany, to participate in teaching plant metabolomics and chemomterics modelling for master students, and in 2009–2010 he held the Alexander von Humboldt fellowship in Germany. Farag now works full time as a professor at the American University in Cairo (AUC) where his research work focuses primarily around applying innovative biochemical technologies (metabolomics) to help answer complex biological questions in medicine, herbal drugs analysis and agriculture. For his highly cited publications of close to 5000 citations and an H index of 32, Farag was selected as a top researcher in the field of plant biology in Africa by the American society of plant biology, United States.

Garcia (Ph.D. 1990, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) is a Professor at the Department of Clinical and Toxicological Analysis at the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of São Paulo, Brazil. A member of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences and São Paulo State Academy of Sciences. She is a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow and an editor at Current Opinion in Microbiology, Molecular and Biochemical Parasitology, Methods X, Current Topics in Medicinal Chemistry, Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences and Associate Editor of Current Research of Microbial Sciences ( 2020- ). Integrated several committees in Brazilian funding agencies and is a consultant of several international agencies such as Welcome Trust, European Research Council, US-Israel Binational Science Foundation, Medical Research Council. Chair of the International Affairs Committee at The American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) and a collaborator of the Provost of Post-Graduation at the University of São Paulo.

Gray is President/CEO of the South African Medical Research Council, Research Professor in Paediatrics at the University of the Witwatersrand, and Member (Professor) in the Vaccine & Infectious Disease Division at the Fred Hutch Cancer Research Center, in Seattle. A Medical Doctor, specialising in Paediatrics, she started her research career in the field of preventing mother to child transmission of HIV-1 (PMTCT). She was awarded a Fogarty Fellowship to study clinical epidemiology at Cornell and Columbia Universities (1999), enabling her to broaden her investigative interests to include: clinical trial design; vaccine. She developed her research in post-natal transmission, focusing on breast-feeding, infant survival and post-exposure prophylaxis. Gray collaborated in multi-country efforts to find short-course and affordable antiretroviral interventions for PMTCT. She co-founded with James McIntyre the Perinatal HIV Research Unit (PHRU) at Baragwanath Hospital, which is now a world-renowned research unit focused on HIV prevention and treatment with grants awarded through competitive international processes from the NIH, USAID, amongst others, amounting to over R120 million pa.

Holden earned his PhD in mathematics from the University of Oslo in 1985, and is Doctor honoris causa, Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, Hanoi. Since 1986 he has been working at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway, where he became a full professor in 1991. He is Secretary General of the International Mathematical Union (2015–2022); Vice-president of the European Mathematical Society (2007–10) and Secretary (2003–06). Holden is an elected member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, the Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences and Letters (President 2014–16), the Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences, the Academia Europaea, the European Academy of Sciences. He is Fellow of the American Mathematical Society and of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics. In 2024 he was appointed Knight of 1st Class of the Royal Norwegian Order of Saint Olav.

Jahiruddin (PhD, 1986, Aberdeen University) is a Professor of Soil Science, former Dean of the Faculty of Agriculture and former Associate Director of Central Laboratory at Bangladesh Agricultural University. He obtained BAS Gold Medal Award 2009, Global Research Impact Award 2017, BAAG Gold Medal Award 2018 and Soil Care Award 2018. He is a Fellow of Bangladesh Academy of Sciences (BAS). Professor Jahiruddin has a very high record of research publications in relation to Micronutrient problems, arsenic contamination and conservation agriculture. He worked as a team leader for research priority setting in agriculture and development of vision document -2030 and beyond in Bangladesh: Land and Soil Resource Management.

Lu, Ph.D. from Columbia University, worked at AT&T Bell Labs; later joined the Electronics Research and Service Organisation (ERSO) of Taiwan's Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) to lead Taiwan’s National Submicron Project. He is the Chairman and CEO of Ardentec Corp., and serves as the President and CTO of Macronix International. He has published more than 500 technical papers and has been granted 160 patents. Lu has been elected as an IEEE Fellow, American Physical Society Fellow, Fellow of National Academy of Inventors, and ITRI Laureate. He has been awarded the IEEE Third Millennium Medal; the IEEE Frederik Philips Award; and the 2013 Presidential Science Prize, the highest award in Taiwan. In 2018, Lu was elected as an Academician of Academia Sinica, the first CEO from industry to have been honored by Academia Sinica.

Mayor is an Indian cell biologist. After studying chemistry at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, he was awarded his PhD in life sciences from The Rockefeller University, New York, and worked as a post-doctoral fellow at Columbia University. In 1995, he joined the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), Bangalore, a centre of TIFR where he has been studying the fine structure and the function of the membrane of living cells using methods derived from biology, chemistry, and physics. He has been elected as a Fellow of Indian Academy of Sciences, Indian Science Academy, a Foreign Fellow of National Academy of Sciences (USA), and European Molecular Biology Organization. He has been awarded the TWAS Prize in Biology and the Infosys Prize in Life Sciences. He serves as Director of NCBS, and was Director of the Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine (inStem) at Bangalore, and is founding director of Centre for Cell and Molecular Platforms (CCAMP), a technology enabler and biotech start-up incubator; together these make up the Bangalore Life Science Cluster, a multi-institutional organization that he has driven since 2015.

Lynn Morris was appointed as the Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Research and Innovation at Wits University from 1 April 2021. Her previous positions include Interim Executive Director of the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) and Principal Medical Scientist and head of the HIV Virology Section at the NICD, Johannesburg, South Africa. She holds a joint appointment as Research Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand and an Honorary appointment as a Senior Scientist at CAPRISA. She completed her undergraduate studies at Wits University and obtained a DPhil from the University of Oxford in 1988. Lynn is an NRF A-rated researcher (leading international scholar) who has made significant contributions to our understanding of how the antibody response to HIV develops and her laboratory conducts validated end-point assays for HIV vaccine clinical trials. She has been recognised through several national and international awards including the Wits Vice Chancellor’s Research Award and The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) Prize in Medical Sciences. She has supervised 30 PhD and MSc students, has published over 270 papers holding a current author H-Index of 63

Ngila (PhD,1996, University of New South Wales) holds MSc in Chemistry (1992), Bachelor of Education in Science (1986), Kenyatta University (KU). Her research is in water quality monitoring and nanotechnology for water treatment. She taught at KU (1989-1997); University of Botswana (1998-2006); University of KwaZulu Natal (2006-2011); and University of Johannesburg (2011-2017) as a Full Professor of Analytical/Environmental Chemistry. She was Head of Applied Chemistry Department (2013- 2016) and Ag. Director of the Water Node of the Nanotechnology Innovation Centre (2015) at the University of Johannesburg; Deputy Director at Morendat Institute of Oil and Gas, (April 2017- Feb 2020) and Deputy Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, Riara University, Kenya (Feb 2020-current). She has over 200 journal articles. She trained over 30 Doctoral Students, 33 Masters and 22 Honours Students and 18 Postdoctoral Research Fellows. Awards include 2017 African Union Kwame Nkrumah and 2016 South Africa Distinguished Women in Science. Member of Academy of Science of South Africa; African Academy of Science. Currently Co-Chair of the 2021 Commonwealth Science Conference hosted by Royal Soc. and AAS.

Savino was graduated in Biological Sciences at the University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (1974), got his MSc degree in Histology and Embryology at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (1979), PhD degree in Cell and Tissue Biology at the University of São Paulo (1982), and had a post-doc training in Cellular Immunology at Necker Hospital, Paris (1983-1985). Presently, he is full researcher at the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation. He is a member of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences; Editor-in-Chief of the journal NeuroImmunoModulation and Associated Editor of Frontiers in Immunology. He received international awards, namely the title of Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Palmes Académiques (France), Doctor Honoris causa by Sorbonne Université (France), the Luis Federico Leloir Medal (Argentinian government), Guest of Honor (National University of Rosário, Argentina) and Eduardo Charreau Award (Argentinian Government). His research is focused in cellular immunology, with emphasis in cell migration in the hemopoietic system; neuroimmune interactions; cell therapy and immunotherapy in neuromuscular diseases.