Journal of Antibiotics Research

Dr. Ravindra K. Malik is presently working as a Professor in Natural Sciences Department at Albany State University in Georgia in United States. He has completed his Ph.D. in Alabama A&M University. He is an Editorial Member in Various International Journals. He has number of publications and presentations on his name. He has received several honors during his career. He is a Committee member in Center of Excellence for Community Engagement (CECE) Advisory Committee, ASU ‘University Hearing Board’ member and also in ASU Global Programs Advisory Committee. He has almost 14 years of experience in teaching of Natural Sciences Department. He published as Author and Co-Author 21 papers in different journals and presented several oral and poster presentation in different conferences.

Research: Dr. Ravindra K. Malik’s research interest includes Initial Genetic Evaluation of Napier grass, Germ plasmas, Napier grass Biomass Yield and Quality Affected by Use of Poultry Litter, Carbon Sequestration by Napier grass Cultivation, with USDA-ARS Tifton, GA, USA scientists, nutrient management, study of gopher tortoise under chehaw  Parks conditions, Albany, Georgia, USA.

Dr. Juan C Salazar is Professor and Chair in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Connecticut Health Center, and Physician in Chief at Connecticut Children’s Medical Center. He also directs the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases and the Pediatric and Youth HIV Program at the Connecticut Children’s Medical Center. He has joined the full time faculty at the University of Connecticut’s Department of Pediatrics in November of 1998. In September of 2013 he was promoted to Professor of Pediatrics and appointed Chair of the Department of Pediatrics at the UConn School of Medicine. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, member of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, the Pediatric Infectious Disease Society, the HIV Medical Association and the Hartford and Connecticut State Medical Societies. He has a joint appointment as Professor of Immunology and a member of the graduate school in Public Health at the UConn Health Center. He is graduated from Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá, Colombia in 1986. He completed his Residency in Pediatrics at the University of Connecticut and a Fellowship in Pediatric Infectious Diseases at the University of Minnesota Medical School. He also holds a Masters in Public Health/Epidemiology from the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. He is also a board certified in Pediatrics and Pediatric Infectious Diseases. He has authored and co-authored over 70 papers and book chapters describing his research and various topics in infectious diseases.

Research: His basic translational research interest focuses on the pathogenesis of spirochetal diseases including Lyme disease and syphilis. He has NIH funded to (1) conduct a translational study of syphilis in Colombia and (2) to assess the role of the innate immune responses in humans to Borrelia burgdorferi, the causative agent of Lyme disease. He has been the principal investigator for a variety of NIH and pharmaceutical industry sponsored clinical trials, including anti-retroviral treatment, childhood vaccines and antibiotics for common pediatric infections.

Dr. Zafar K. Khan is presently working as a Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Drexel University College of Medicine in the United States. Earlier he served as Senior Scientist, Department Chair and Deputy Director Central Drug Research Institute (CDRI) - a premier government organization chartered for novel drugs, diagnostics and human vaccines in India. He has been recipient of numerous fellowships and was Visiting Scientist in Pasteur Institute, France; Forschungs Institute, Germany; Uniformed Services, Bethesda, Maryland; and Texas Tech. Hlth Sci.Center, USA. Dr. Khan has over 30 year’s research experience on microbial pathogenesis and therapy of infectious diseases including retroviruses and opportunistic infections. His current research efforts primarily focus on defining the mechanism of virus-induced neuroinflammation and demyelination in the central and peripheral nervous system in order to identify potential diagnostic markers and targets for therapeutic intervention. His other areas of research are HIV and HCV co-infection, HIV-1 therapeutics & microbicide development, high-throughput (HTS) screening assays, pre-clinical evaluation of antibiotic and antiviral agents, transgenic animal modeling of microbial/viral infections and immunology of neuro-inflammation. Dr. Khan is also an Adjunct Professor, in the Blumberg Institute of Living Sciences, Pennsylvania Biotechnology Center, USA. Dr. Khan has the credited for publishing over 120 research papers, several patents, edited book and book chapters; and is a professional member of numerous prestigious scientific societies.

Dr. Saleh A. Naser is presently working as a Professor of Medicine and Graduate Coordinator in Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences at the University of Central Florida, United States. He serves on the board of numerous organizations and peer review journals and as a Reviewer for more than 35 International Journals. His research program has international reputation in the area of Crohn’s disease and Mycobacterium paratuberculosis.  He published more than 77 articles and presented hundreds of conference papers.

Research: His research interests includes role of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis (MAP) in the etiology of Crohn’s disease and Type I Diabetes Mellitus.

Dr. Jean Carlet is 69 years old. Trained in internal medicine, he has been head of the ICU in Hospital St Joseph in Paris during 25 years. He got many different responsibilities in the ministry of health in particular as the president of the Infection control national committee during 12 years, and in many other working groups. He has been president of the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine. He is now a consultant, and president of the World Alliance Against Antibiotic Resistance (WAAAR), since 2011. He has been nominated by the minister of health in 2015 as the president of a special task force for antibiotic preservation. The working group proposed a number of actions to fight against antibiotic resistance, which will be implemented in the near future. He published 238 papers in peer-reviewed journals  (H point:55) and many book chapters.

Dr. Suresh G. Joshi is completed his MD, and MSc and PhD in medical microbiology. Since year 1987 he is in the field of academics, held positions ranging from lecturer through professor at various institutions. He has research experience from the fields of antimicrobial drugs and resistance mechanisms, bacterial pathogen-host interactions and immune responses, infected wound healing, and biofilms and infection control strategies. His current teaching interest includes bacterial infections, antibacterial agents, and vaccines of biodefense interests. Dr. Joshi is a member of American Society of Microbiology (ASM), Infectious Disease Society of America (IDSA), Surgical Infection Society of North America (SISNA), New York Academy of Sciences (NYAS), and holding life memberships of Indian Association of Medical Microbiologist (IAMM), Indian Association of Pathologist and Microbiologist (IAPM) and Society of Biological Chemistry of India (SBC). He is also adjunct professor to Drexel School of Biomedical Engineering, Science and Health Systems, A. J. Drexel Plasma Institute, and University of Pune. Dr. Joshi is proud member of ASM’s International Mentoring Program and Minority Mentoring Program. 

Dr. Janak Padia is presently working as a Associate Professor in Center of Biomolecular Therapeutics (To evaluate and prioritize its project portfolio and to accelerate development of innovative drugs) at University of Maryland, United States.  He was Vice President, Drug R&D Services at Pharmaron and managed integrated projects for chemistry, lead optimization, preclinical candidate identification and development, and IND enabling studies for clients. He has over 25 years of industrial experience in cutting edge drug discovery and development experience and has held management positions of increasing responsibility.  Prior to Pharmaron, he was also Director of Chemistry and Drug Development at Avalon Pharmaceuticals where he oversaw a range of drug discovery and development programs and participated in the strategic management of the company. He has extensive experience in drug discovery and development processes, technology evaluation and implementation of project management tools to drive the projects to completion.  He also has excellent knowledge drug development, formulation development, IND enabling studies, GLP Tox evaluations, GMP drug manufacturing and regulatory affairs. Dr. Padia has also worked for Parke-Davis/Warner-Lambert (now Pfizer), Discovery Partners, and the NCGC-NCATS-NIH in the therapeutic areas of Cancer, Cardiovascular, CNS and antiviral therapeutics.  He has led drug discovery and development efforts during his career that resulted in the identification of several development candidates in the cancer and CNS area. He has authored several scientific publications and is also the inventor of many patents. He holds an adjunct position at Georgetown University Medical Center and serves as an advisor for Drug Discovery Program at GUMC and NIDDK/NIH. 

Dr. Udai P. Singh is presently working as an Associate Professor in the Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology at University of South Carolina, United States. His primary research interest includes in the area of cellular and mucosal immunology, inflammation in general, chemokines, immunotherapy and complimentary and alternative medicine. He is internationally recognized mucosal immunologist working in the area of inflammation since last 15 years. His research contributions span multiple disciplines including cellular and mucosal immunology related to alternative medicine in the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and interstitial cystitis. He obtained his Ph.D. degree from Banaras Hindu University, in India. At present he focusing on how a plant derived compound and/or dietary supplement mediate murine colitis and interstitial cystitis. He has authored more than 75 scientific communications including 1 patent application, ~20 invited lectures. His long time career goal is to understand how alternative medicine remedies mediate IBD and Inflammation in general. 

Research: His research areas include Inflammation, Chemokine’s, mucosal Immunology, Interstitial cystitis, autoimmune diseases, Cellular Immunology, and Intestinal Physiology.

Dr. Jianxun Song is a tenured associate professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, United States. The base of expertise on T cell biology needed to perform his research began to develop while he was a postdoctoral scholar and research scientist from the years 2001-2007 under the mentorship of Dr. Michael Croft at the La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology. He became a junior faculty at The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine in 2007, and extended his research on Developmental Immunology and Stem Cell Biology. As a PI on previous university, foundation, or NIH-funded grants, he laid the groundwork for the research by developing highly reactive T lymphocytes from pluripotent stem cells (PSC). His laboratory was the first to show that induced PSC differentiate into functional T cells for cell-based therapies. In addition to having the expertise to be successful with the research, he offers leadership and administrative skills that were developed during his independence as a mentor of graduate students and postdoctoral scholars. In summary, he has a demonstrated record of successful and productive research projects in the area.

Dr. Robert Todd Striker is presently working as an Associate Professor of Medicine in Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology at University of Wisconsin, United States. He also had American Board of Internal Medicine in Infectious Diseases in 2010. He is also a member in Professional societies like American Association of the Study of Liver, American Gastroenterological Association, American Society of Transplantation, Infectious Diseases Society of America and National Hepatitis in Corrections Network, founding member. He is also a permanent member in American Cancer Society. He almost has 16 years of experience in the field of Infectious disease and almost 25 years of experience in teaching. He has four patent filed in his name. He has more than 40 research publications in his name.

Research: He is interested in new approaches to control RNA viruses, particularly Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) and Dengue Virus.

Dr. Amy H. Tang is presently working as an Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Molecular Cell Biology at Eastern Virginia Medical School (EVMS), United States. She is also working as a Tenure Associate Professor was approved by the Board of Visitors at EVMS. She has worked for nearly 20 years in the field of RAS signaling and cancer biology, investigating the roles, biochemistry and regulation of SIAH-mediated proteolysis downstream of oncogenic EGFR/HER2/K-RAS signaling pathway using Drosophila, mouse and human cancer cell lines, and patient tumor biospecimens.  Recently, she worked as a Principal Investigator in Pancreatic Cancer Action Network- American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) in 2010- 2012. She has been awarded with Dean’s Faculty Achievement Award in Research at EVMS in 2011. She has more than 20 publications under her name. She has Eight Active IRB Protocols at EVMS. She had filed 3 patent applications under her name.

Research: Her research interests are Regulated Proteolysis in ERBB/K-RAS-Mediated Oncogenesis in human cancer, Innate Immunity and Cellular Defense, Genetic Screens for Anti-Cancer Drug Resistance.

Dr. Eugene A. Cioffi is presently working as an Associate Professor in Department of Pharmacology at University of South Alabama, United States. He completed Ph.D. at University of Connecticut. He has more than 10 articles in his name. His research study includes the study of carbohydrates within biological systems has illustrated that are involved in key biological functions such as cell-cell, cell-matrix, and cell-molecule interactions critical to the development and function of a complex multi-cellular organism. These glycans act as mediators in the interactions between different organisms (e.g., between a host and pathogen), and their high intra- and surficial cellular abundance denotes their key roles as recognition and regulatory molecular switches. An increasingly diverse and complete paradigm of molecular biology thus includes the glycans and covalently-linked glycoconjugates, in the context of proteoglycans, glycoproteins, and glycolipids.

Research: His research interest includes cell-cell, cell-matrix, and cell-molecule interactions critical to the development and function of a complex multi-cellular organism.

Dr. George Dinos is presently working as a Associate Professor in Department of Biochemistry at University of Patras, Greece. He has been a Visiting Scholar at the Max-Plank Institute of Molecular Genetics in Berlin for long periods and Visiting Research Fellow at Gene Center & Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, of Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich. He has given a series of lectures in Academic and Research Centers of Europe. He is also member of scientific societies like Hellenic Society of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, Association of Greek Chemists, American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, American Society for Microbiology (ASM).

Research: His research interests are focused on the Biochemistry field, in particular on the structure and function of prokaryotic ribosome. In his interests are more precisely included: ribosomes assembly,   ribosome function and structure, isolation and functions of subribosomal complexes, antibiotics mode of action, mechanism of antibiotic resistance, development of new antibiotics.

Dr. Magdolna Csávás is presently working as an Associate Professor in Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy at University of Debrecen, Hungary. Her research interest can be divided into two main parts: carbohydrate and antibiotic chemistry. In the field of carbohydrate chemistry, she is interested in the synthesis of multivalent glycoclusters as potential ligands of lectins, cyclodextrin chemistry, building block strategies and application of (tio)click-chemistry in the synthesis of glycoconjugates. Her research interest is in the field of antibiotic chemistry: synthetic modification of glycopeptide antibiotics and preparation of chimeric antibiotics to fight against multidrug-resistant bacteria. 

Research: Dr. Magdolna Csávás research interests are: Synthesis of potential antimicrobial compounds, as multivalent glycoclusters and chimeric antibiotics Investigation of lectin-carbohydrate interactions Synthetic modification of glycopeptide antibiotics Preparation of carbohydrate-antibiotic chimeric compounds Cyclodextrin Chemistry

Dr. Ghassan M. Matar is presently working as a Professor in the Department of Experimental Pathology, Immunology & Microbiology and Laboratory Director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research at the Faculty of Medicine, American University of Beirut (AUB), Lebanon. He received his PhD in Basic Medical Sciences (Microbiology) from AUB and was a post-doctoral fellow (Fulbright) at the Centers for Disease Control Prevention (CDC) and Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. He was then appointed as Research Microbiologist at the Division of Bacterial and Mycotic Diseases, CDC. He was also appointed as Assistant Dean at the Faculty of Health Science, AUB. In addition, he serves on Faculty of Medicine (FM) and University wide committees at AUB, in WHO as resource advisor in the Advisory Group on Integrated Surveillance of Antimicrobial Agents (AGISAR), and as American Society for Microbiology (ASM) Ambassador for Lebanon. His Laboratory also has a PulseNet Laboratory certified by CDC/NAMRU3. To present he served as an academic advisor to 40 graduate students, published around 87 articles in reputable refereed international journals and presented 115 abstracts in international, regional and local conferences. He received funding from various extramural sources such as: CDC, U.S. Department of Defense (DOD), WHO/AGISAR, PulseNet (CDC, WHO, MOPH) and others.

Research: His research interests include: 1) Molecular mechanisms of resistance to antimicrobial agents in pathogenic bacteria, namely methicillin resistance in S. aureus, macrolide resistance in S. pneumoniae and carbapenem resistance in ESBL and non-ESBL producing Enterobacteriaceae, 2) Potential Treatment with antibacterial agents singly or in combination of E. coli O157:H7 and E. coli O104:H4 infections in a mouse model, 3) Genetic basis of biofilm production in P. aeruginosa isolated from patients with nosocomial infections and potential inhibition of biofilm formation by antifungal agents in in vitro and in vivo studies, 4) Expression levels of virulence factors produced by pathogenic bacterial agents in relation to disease production, 5) Molecular epidemiology of foodborne diseases and nosocomial infections, 6) Assessment of combination therapy in infections caused by carbapenem resistant Enterobacteriaceae harboring various carbapenemase encoding genes, 7) Molecular characterization of Listeria monocyogenes from food items.

Dr. Bedenić Branka is presently working as a Professor in the Department of Microbiology of School of Medicine at University of Zagreb, Croatia. She is specialist in Medical Microbiology and Parasitology and she did his training on Microbiology, Pathology, Biology and Microbiology and Hygiene in various countries. She is involved in various scientific projects. She has more than 100 publications under his name in various International Journals. She also published more than 70 abstracts in various Conference books. She has Number of publications under his name are as follows: CC-35, SCI-Expanded-7,  IM-14, conference abstracts 74, chapters in books and manuals-9. Teaching and mentorship experience: practices and seminars in basic microbiology and parasitology, seminars, mentorship experience: 8 PhD Thesis, 12 Bachelor Degree Thesis.

Research: Her research interests are beta-lactamases, mechanisms of bacterial resistance to antibiotics and molecular methods in microbiology.

Dr. Elena A. Usacheva is presently working as an Research Scientist in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Microbiology and Infectious Diseases Research at NorthShore University HealthSystem in the United States. She is also Assistant Professor in University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, USA. Her PhD in molecular biology was completed in Federal Center of Genetic and Selection of Industrial Microorganisms in Moscow, Russia. She had specific training in the field of DNA instability and unusual DNA formation at the Center for Genome Research, Institute Bioscience and Technology, Houston, USA. At Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine (Chicago) she extended her experience in the field of neurodegenerative diseases in genetic and protein projects. Dr. Usacheva has over 20 year’s research experience and broad background in molecular biology and microbiology. Her current interest is in the area of molecular microbiology, developing new molecular diagnostics for infection diseases. Special interest is antimicrobial resistance and its detection. As PI on NIH-funded grants and diagnostics clinical trials her goal is implementing of advanced technologies to clinical diagnostics of infectious diseases. She has demonstrated a record of successful research in many peer-reviewed manuscripts and international meetings.

Research: Her research interests are Antimicrobial resistance Molecular detection of clinical pathogens  Applied molecular biology Research on nosocomial and community pathogens Bacteria-host interaction Biomarkers for infectious diseases

Dr. Zhang Xue-Hong is presently working as a Professor and Executive Dean in School of Life Sciences and Biotechnology at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China. He has almost 25 years of experience in the field of Biotechnology. He also worked as Visiting Researcher in the Department of Chemistry and Biotechnology in the School of Engineering at The University of Tokyo, Japan. He completed Ph.D. Studies in Bioengineering at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. He is mainly engaged in biotechnology research and teaching, which involved in the microbial metabolic engineering, separation and purification of biological materials, and protein engineering. He had published more than 20 International articles in last three years.

Research: His research interests include Microbial Metabolic Engineering Bio separation Processes Biocides & Natural Products

Dr. Asif Ali is presently working as an Assistant Professor in Academy of Scientific & Innovative Research (AcSIR), India. He is also working as a Senior Scientist in the Natural Product Division at Indian Institute of Integrative Medicine-CSIR, India. Earlier he served as Visiting Scientist, at Max Planck Institute of Colloidal and Interference, Berlin, Germany. He has been recipient of numerous fellowships CRP-NRF, Singapore and Novertis fellowship for senior Research Fellow in National University of Singapore. He has  over  12  year’s  research  experience mainly  involved  Discovery,  Synthesis, Isolation and characterization of bioactive metabolite from the natural sources (plants, microbes and marine organism). In addition to that he is keen on to develop a platform for novel synthetic methods of stereoselective synthesis of carbohydrate containing compounds like glycolipids, phospholipids, glycosides and glycopeptides, which are used as tools to achieve the new biological knowledge. The carbohydrate based antigenic molecules that stimulate the antibodies or immune cells to fight disease but carbohydrate based agents glycolipid, glycoproteins and polysaccharide can be difficult to isolate from natural sources due to hetrogenecity, contamination problem so the synthetic techniques are making it possible to envision a new generation of carbohydrate based vaccine. He has the credited for publishing over 32 research papers, and is a professional member of numerous prestigious scientific societies.

Dr. Luis Claudio Nascimento da Silva is presently working as a Guest research at Department of Biology, Section of Functional Genomics of University of Copenhagen (KU). He also worked as Professor and Coordinator of Graduate Specialization in Molecular Diagnostic at Pernambuco Faculty of Health (FPS, Recife, Brazil). He had studied Biomedical Science and completed his MSc and PhD in Biological Sciences in Federal University of Pernambuco (Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, UFPE) and then his took a postdoc position at KU. His research has been focused on genetic of bacteria and biomedical applications of natural products (secondary metabolites, essential oils, lectins) especially from Caatinga plants (Semi-arid biome from Brazil). He is member of the Editorial board of Frontiers in Microbiology as Guest associate editor of the Research topic “New frontiers in the search of antimicrobials agents from natural products”. He also served as Referee for various International Journals including Frontiers in Microbiology, Molecules, Journal of Medicinal Plant Research and European Journal of Medicinal Plants). 

Research: His research interests includes: (1) The investigation of control mechanism of bacterial chromosome replication; (2) Development of compounds that target the DNA synthesis machinery; (3) Anti-virulence and anti-infective compounds; (4) Antibiotic resistance modulators; (4) Natural products from plants.

Dr. Tzi Bun NG is presently working as an Professor of Biochemistry in School of Biomedical Sciences at Chinese University of Hong Kong, China. He is also works as Principal investigator and Co- investigator of over 40 research projects funded by the Hong Kong Government including RGC, RFCID, ITF and HMRF projects. He is also a Reviewer of research grant applications submitted to National Science Foundation of China (NSFC), Singapore Medical Council, National Science Center, Poland, Hong Kong Baptist University, South African Research Council. He obtained his Ph.D. degree from the Memorial University of Newfoundland in Canada. He pursued postdoctoral training at the University of California in San Francisco. He has supervised a large number of postdoctoral fellows and graduate students. He has published over five hundred papers in international journals and a number of book chapters. Some of these papers are about leguminous lectins, antifungal proteins, ribosome inactivating proteins, protease inhibitors, and peroxidases. He serves as the editorial board member of several journals including International Journal of Peptides, Journal of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in the Post Genomic Era and Frontiers in Cellulose Biotechnology. He has reviewed research grant applications and manuscripts submitted to various journals for publications.

Research: His research interests are Bioactive proteins and peptides from Chinese medicinal plants such as lectins, ribosome inactivating proteins and enzyme inhibitors. Brain hormones, pituitary hormones and other hormones. Natural products with anti-human immunodeficiency virus activity.