Senthil Arumugam, PhD, Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, Australia
Dr Senthil Arumugam obtained his PhD training in the lab of Prof Petra Schwille at the Max Planck Institute for Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden, Germany, focusing on self-organisation of proteins involved in bacterial cell division. His post-doctoral work in the labs of Prof Patricia Bassereau and Prof Ludger Johannes at the Curie Institute, Paris, France, focused on protein-membrane interactions and cellular trafficking. Dr Arumugam joined Single Molecule Science at the University of New South Wales as an independent group leader in September 2016 and established the Lattice Light-Sheet Imaging infrastructure with his research focused on endosomal trafficking. At EMBL Australia at the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, Senthil spearheads an interdisciplinary group focussed on cellular physiology. Website.
Suvendra Bhattacharyya, PhD, University of Nebraska Medical Center, USA
Dr Suvendra Bhattacharyya began his tenure as a Professor at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in the year 2023 after leading the Molecular Genetic Division at CSIR-Indian Institute of Chemical Biology in Kolkata, India, from 2008 to 2023. His PhD research on mitochondrial tRNA import earned him various national and international honors, including the Scienc/GE Healthcare Young Scientist Award from AAAS in the USA in 2004. He conducted his postdoctoral studies on microRNA-mediated gene regulation in mammalian cells under the mentorship of Professor Witold Filipowicz at the Friedrich Miescher Institute in Basel, Switzerland. Currently, his research interests lie in understanding how RNA binding proteins and extracellular export regulate the activity of miRNAs in mammalian neurons, immune cells, and cancer cells. His extensive publication record in this area has garnered recognition, leading to several awards, including research funding from HFSP and the Wellcome Trust. Website.
Rotem Rubinstein, PhD, Tel Aviv University, Israel
Dr Rotem Rubinstein is an Assistant Professor in the School of Neurobiology, Biochemistry, and Biophysics at Tel Aviv University. He earned his PhD at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, mentored by Professors Andras Fiser and Steve Almo, focusing on the structure-function relationships of immune regulatory proteins. In his postdoctoral research at Columbia University, guided by Professor Barry Honig, Dr Rubinstein worked in the field of cell adhesion. At Tel Aviv University, Dr Rubinstein leads a laboratory dedicated to elucidating the structural principles of protein-protein interactions involving cell surface adhesion and receptor proteins. His research targets understanding signaling complexes that play pivotal roles in neuronal development and immune regulation through a multidisciplinary approach that combines experimental techniques such as Cryo-EM, X-ray crystallography, Biophysical methods, and computational methods. Website.
Jakub Sedzinski, PhD, Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Stem Cell Medicine (reNEW), Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Associate Professor Jakub Sedzinski leads the Mechanics of Tissue Homeostasis group at the NNF Center for Stem Cell Medicine (reNEW), University of Copenhagen. His background spans biology, physics, and computational biology. He earned his PhD at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden, Germany, where he applied biophysical approaches to uncover fundamental mechanisms of cytokinesis. During his EMBO postdoctoral fellowship at UT Austin, he expanded his expertise in cell and tissue mechanics, focusing on the role of mechanical forces in embryonic development and defining the novel cell behavior of apical emergence. Since 2017, he has established himself as a leader in mucociliary epithelia mechanics, working at the interface of basic and applied biology using Xenopus embryos and human respiratory organoids. Website.
Yinghao Wu, PhD, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, USA
Yinghao Wu is an associate professor at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Department of Systems and Computational Biology. With more than 70 publications, his lab is focusing on developing multiscale simulation and deep learning tools to study ligand-receptor interactions and ligand-induced receptor clustering at cell surfaces. He is also interested in discovering biological therapeutics, such as antibodies and multi-specific fusion proteins, to target membrane receptors in various protein superfamilies, including but not limited to immunoglobulin or tumor necrosis factor superfamilies. Website.
