{"id":18,"date":"2024-05-07T15:46:09","date_gmt":"2024-05-07T13:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/?page_id=18"},"modified":"2026-06-12T15:56:54","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T13:56:54","slug":"participants","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/participants\/","title":{"rendered":"Committee"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The Organizing Committee welcomes you to Polaris Technology Park, located in the territory of Pula (Cagliari) in a natural park at the foot of the Sulcis Mountains, on the South-Western coast of Sardinia. We look forward to sharing a broader view of current and future antiviral strategies in this amazing place!<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Organizers of the 8th IAAASS 2026: scientific curricula & career path<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Enzo Tramontano <\/strong>(Cagliari, Italy)<\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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ENZO TRAMONTANO <\/span><\/em><\/strong>is full professor of Microbiology and Chair of the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Cagliari, Italy. He holds a degree (1990) from the University of Cagliari (Italy), and has been Visiting Research Scientist at the Department of Pharmacology at Yale University Medical School (CT, USA, 1990-1992 and 1996-1998). Since 1998 he is at the University of Cagliari where he also served as Director of the PhD program in Life, Environmental and Drug Sciences (2013-2019) and Dean of the Faculty of Biology and Pharmacy (2015-2021). Since 2022 he is Vice-President of the Italian Society for Virology (SIV-ISV). He is Associated Editor of Viruses and editor for several journals. From 2006 he is head of the Molecular Virology center of the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences of the University of Cagliari. His research activities mostly focused on the development of antiviral drugs and the study of endogenous retroviriuses and he supervised 12 PhD students. Particularly, he published > 180 papers related to i) antiviral drug discovery using both biochemical and cell-based techniques to evaluate the ability of small molecules to block the enzymatic function of viral enzymes and to inhibit viral replication; ii) identification and characterization of retroviral sequences stably integrated into human genomes and definition of their transcriptome to explore their physiological and pathological role; iii) understanding the viral impact on the host cell and in particular on the pathways involved in the innate immunity viral evasion also to exploit these molecular determinants as drug targets.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Reuben Harris <\/strong>(San Antonio, TX \u2013 USA)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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REUBEN HARRIS<\/strong> is an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) and chair of the Biochemistry and Structural Biology department at the University of Texas Health San Antonio. <\/span><\/span>He received his B.S. (1993) and Ph.D. (1997) degrees from the University of Alberta and performed postdoctoral work at Baylor College of Medicine (1997-1998), Yale University (1998), and Cambridge University (1998-2003). He joined the University of Minnesota as an Assistant Professor in 2003 and was promoted to Associate Professor with Tenure in 2008 and to Full Professor in 2013. In 2022, Dr. Harris moved his laboratory to the University of Texas Health San Antonio. Dr Harris has received numerous grants and awards, including a Searle Scholarship, American Academy of Microbiology membership, NIH Merit Award, a Distinguished McKnight University Professorship, and the KT Jeang Prize. In 2015, he was also appointed as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. Dr. Harris is an Associate Editor for Science Advances and an Editorial Board Member for the Journal of Biological Chemistry, Journal of Virology, and Cancer Research. He has published over 200 manuscripts, contributed to 13 patent applications, and co-founded a cancer therapeutics company. Dr. Harris\u2019s scientific passion is elucidating mechanisms of mutation and establishing relevance to human biology and disease. As a doctoral student, he discovered a novel recombination-dependent mutation process operative in stationary-phase bacteria with implications for antibiotic resistance and microbial evolution. As a postdoctoral fellow, he helped solve an immunology Rosetta stone by discovering the DNA cytosine deaminase activity of AID and proposing a DNA deamination model for antibody gene diversification. Also as a postdoctoral fellow, he discovered the DNA cytosine deaminase activity of several APOBEC family members and, during the transition to faculty, elucidated a new mechanism of antiviral immunity by demonstrating APOBEC3G-catalyzed retroviral cDNA hypermutation. As a Principal Investigator, Dr. Harris has become known for his work on APOBEC enzymes in antiviral immunity. This body of work has shed light on fundamental mechanisms of antiviral immunity and yielded new strategies for drug development. In recent years, Dr. Harris\u2019s virology studies have also enabled a major breakthrough in cancer research. His group found that APOBEC3 enzymes are responsible for a large proportion of mutations in breast, head\/neck, lung, bladder, cervical, and other cancers. Independent work has confirmed these results and indicated that \u201cAPOBEC mutagenesis\u201d far exceeds most other sources of mutations in cancer, including those attributable to smoking and UV rays. These breakthroughs have created new opportunities for cancer diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment by targeting tumor evolvability. One of his other passions is training and mentoring the next-generation of scientists, and he has trained a multitude of students and postdoctoral fellows over his career. Importantly, all of these trainees have succeeded in obtaining independent positions in academia or industry.<\/span><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Angela Corona (Cagliari – Italy)<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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ANGELA CORONA <\/span><\/em><\/span><\/em><\/strong>is an Associated Professor of Microbiology at the University of Cagliari. She graduated in Pharmaceutical Chemistry at the University of Cagliari in 2010 and earned in 2014 a PhD in Biology and Biochemistry. She was Guest Researcher in 2011\/2012 at the Drug Resistance Program, Center for Excellence in HIV \/ AIDS and Cancer Virology, Center for Cancer Research at the National Cancer Institute, MD, USA and in 2013 at the Laboratoire de Biologie et Pharmacologie appliqu\u00e9e, Ecole Normale Superieure de Cachan, Paris. Since 2015 she has been a post-doctoral researcher at the Molecular Virology Laboratory of the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Cagliari. In 2017 she was Research Fellow at the IrsiCaixaAIDS Research Institute, Hospital Germans Trias and Pujol, Barcelona, granted by Chu Family Foundation (CFF) Women Scientists Award. Since 2020 she was Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Biology and Pharmacy, Department of Life and Environmental Sciences, Section of Molecular Virology, University of Cagliari (Italy). Angela is a molecular virologist whose research activity has different topics related to the identification and characterization of the mechanism of action of antiviral molecules with different targets: she started her antiviral research activity working on the ribonuclease-H function associated with the HIV-1 reverse transcriptase. She also investigates the pathological roles of viral proteins to validate novel targets for drug development. In particular, she focused on Ebola virus proteins involved in the inhibition of innate immune response (VP35 and VP24 proteins). Her expertise in biochemical assays is coupled with expertise in the evaluation of antiviral activity in cell-based assays for Class 2 and Class 3 viral agents. F<\/em>or her research activities, she was awarded the \u201cCecilia Cioffrese- Malattie Virali 2016\u201d prize by the Carlo Erba Foundation. Her work has resulted in 124 publications including papers and book chapters. She is part of the editorial board of Frontiers as Review Editor in Experimental Pharmacology and Drug Discovery and in Antivirals and Vaccines.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Nicole Grandi (Cagliari – Italy)<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Nicole Grandi<\/strong> obtained her PhD in Life, Environmental and Drug Sciences in 2017 and is currently Associate Professor of Microbiology at the University of Cagliari. She leads the Bioinformatics Unit at the Laboratory of Molecular Virology, Department of Life and Environmental Sciences, where her research integrates molecular virology and microbiology with the computational analysis of omics data.Her main scientific focus is on human endogenous retroviruses (HERVs), including the characterization of their integration sites in the human genome, their evolutionary dynamics in non-human primates, and their expression in pathological contexts such as cancer, autoimmunity, and viral infections. Her work aims to identify specific HERV elements modulated in pathological conditions and to investigate their potential contribution to disease pathogenesis, as well as their value as novel therapeutic targets, using in vitro and in vivo (D. Melanogaster) models, with particular attention to the interplay between viral gene transcription and host immune effectors. For her research on HERVs in the context of SARS-CoV-2 infection, she received the 2022 Luria Award from the Italian Society for Virology (SIV-ISV).More recently, she has applied metagenomic and metatranscriptomic approaches to the characterization and functional investigation of environmental microorganisms, to understand their biodiversity and ecological roles. She is currently studying prokaryotic, eukaryotic, and viral communities in the hypersaline environments of active and inactive salterns in Cagliari, assessing the effects of anthropogenic activities on microbial adaptation and exploring their biotechnological potential.She has served as principal investigator of seven projects in these research areas and has contributed to six additional projects on viral diversity, infectious diseases, and antiviral research. She is currently Work Package Leader of ACT4TRAIN, a PN-RIC 2021\u20132027 project within the INF-ACT Foundation focused on higher education pathways supporting health technologies and innovative diagnostics for emerging infectious diseases.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Johan <\/b>Neyts<\/b> (Leuven, Belgium)<\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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JOHAN NEYTS<\/span><\/em><\/strong> is full professor of Virology at the University of Leuven (KU Leuven), Belgium where he teaches virology at the medical school and at the school of dentistry.  His laboratory www.antivirals.be<\/a>  has a long-standing expertise in the development of antivirals strategies and drugs against emerging and neglected viral infections such as dengue and other flaviviruses, Chikungunya and other alphaviruses, enteroviruses, noroviruses, HDV, HEV, rabies and coronaviruses. An ultrapotent pan-serotype dengue inhibitor developed in his laboratory and at the Centre for Drug Design & Development (www.cd3.be<\/a>) is currently in phase II clinical studies at Janssen Pharmaceutica (J&J) and efficacy has recently been shown in dengue infected humans. A second focus is on the development of the PLLAV (Plasmid Launched Live Attenuated Virus) vaccine technology, which is based on the yellow fever virus vaccine as a vector. It allows to rapidly engineer highly thermostable vaccines against multiple viral pathogens. Johan is a past-president of the International Society for Antiviral Research. He is the co-founder of KU Leuven spin-off companies AstriVax www.astrivax.com<\/a> and Okapi Sciences. He is responsible for the Belgian VirusBank platform www.virusbankplatform.be<\/a>  an investment of the Belgian Federal Government in epidemic\/pandemic preparedness. He published >660 papers,  received multiple national and international awards, has given ~350 invited lectures and a large number of interviews to lay-press.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Elias Maccioni <\/b>(Cagliari, Italy)<\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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ELIAS MACCIONI<\/strong> (1966) holds a degree from the University of Cagliari, Italy, (1990) and was appointed Assistant Professor of medicinal chemistry in 1992. In 1993 to 1994 he was Visiting Researcher at the Department of Chemistry of the University of Bangor, North Wales. In 2005 he was appointed Associate Professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the Faculty of Pharmacy of the University of Cagliari. He now leads a research group of Drug Discovery at the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences of the University of Cagliari. He is member of the Italian society of Medicinal Chemistry . Moreover he is coordinator of the Paul Ehrlich Network of European Medicinal Chemistry PhD for the University of Cagliari. His research is mainly directed towards the design and synthesis of HIV 1 reverse transcriptase and human monoamine oxidase inhibitors.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Kathie <\/b>Seley<\/b>-Radtke <\/b>(Baltimore, MD \u2013 USA)<\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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KATHERINE SELEY-RADTKE <\/em><\/strong>is a Professor in the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Her medicinal chemistry research focuses on targeting coronaviruses, filoviruses, flaviviruses among other infectious diseases, using her novel \u201cfleximer\u201d nucleoside\/tide scaffolds. Prof. Seley-Radtke is currently the President of the International Society for Antiviral Research (ISAR), as well as a past President and current Secretary for the International Society for Nucleosides, Nucleotides & Nucleic Acids (IS3NA). She also chaired of the 2023 Gordon Research Conference on Nucleosides, Nucleotides & Oligonucleotides. Prof. Seley-Radtke also serves as Editor in Chief of Annual Reports in Medicinal Chemistry, and as Associate Editor of Science Advances\/AAAS. Some of her other service contributions include her continuing role as one of the U.S. National Academies of Science\u2019s Jefferson Science Fellows with the U.S. Dept. of State and the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, Russia. For the past 22 years, Kathie has served on numerous NIH and other funding agency review panels, including as Chair\/Alternate Chair. Most notably, Kathie has been heavily involved in mentoring junior colleagues, and as part of this, when she was President of IS3NA, she initiated the Chu Family Foundation Fellowships for Early Career Women for both IS3NA and ISAR, and she continues to Chair that important committee for both Societies. She has published over 100 papers and book chapters, has 27 patents, given over 170 invited and plenary lectures world-wide, and has received many honors including the American Chemical Society\u2019s Chemist of the Year in 2016, the University of Maryland System\u2019s Regents\u2019 Faculty Award for Excellence in Research in 2017, the 2015-2018 UMBC Presidential Research Professor, as well as one of the Baltimore Sun\u2019s 25 Women to Watch. More recently she was selected as Kathie was awarded the 2020 ISAR Anton\u00edn Holy Memorial Award for her outstanding accomplishments and demonstrated service to the antiviral and medicinal chemistry field. The Holy award is the Society\u2019s top honor for chemists.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Vincenzo Summa <\/span><\/strong>(Naples, <\/span>Italy)<\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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VINCENZO SUMMA <\/strong>is a full professor of Medicinal Chemistry in department of Pharmacy at Federico II University, Naples, since May 2019. He is one of the founders in 2009 of IRBM spa a research center formally a spin-off of the Merck Research Laboratories located in Rome. He also served as  Vice-president, Drug Discovery of IRBM spa. Vincenzo is graduated in Industrial Chemistry at the University of Rome \u2018La Sapienza\u2019 in 1991 and in 1997 obtained his Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry at Bergische Universit\u00e4t Wuppertal. From 1992 to 1994 was also a  fellow at the University of Rome \u201cLa Sapienza\u201d. In 1996 he started his industrial carrier at  Merck Research Laboratory in Rome at the Medicinal Chemistry Department. He gained increasing scientific and managerial responsibility becoming Director in the Med. Chem. department. He led several projects mainly in antiviral drug discovery and development  fields bringing successfully several compounds into the clinical development. Vincenzo\u2019s most relevant scientific contributions are the discovery of two antiviral drugs, Raltegravir (Isentress), the First in Class HIV integrase inhibitor approved and Grazoprevir the Best in Class HCV protease inhibitors. He received important awards for the discovery of these two very important drugs. He was appointed twice Heroes of Chemistry from the American Chemical Society for the discovery, Raltegravir ( ISENTRESS\u00ae) the first in class HIV int. inh. in 2013 and , in 2017 for the discovery of Grazoprevir-ZAPATIER\u00ae the Best in class HCV protease inhibitor. He received the Hol\u00ec Memorial Award by the International Society for Antiviral Research in 2023. The most recent award is the Medaglia Giacomello for the Division of Medicinal Chemistry of the Italian Chemistry Society in August 2024. The current main research areas are in antivirals, epigenetic modulators, neglect  and rare  diseases<\/span><\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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8th IAAASS 2026 Secretaria<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Carla Piras<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

email: iaaass@unica.it<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Michela Coco
Co.S.Me.Se<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

WebMedia manager Antonio Lupia<\/em>  <\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

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The Organizing Committee welcomes you to Polaris Technology Park, located in the territory of Pula (Cagliari) in a natural park at the foot of the Sulcis Mountains, on the South-Western …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9643,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-18","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/18","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9643"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18"}],"version-history":[{"count":62,"href":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/18\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1260,"href":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/18\/revisions\/1260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.unica.it\/iaaass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}