Invited speakers
INVITED SPEAKER
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Andrew Pelling, University of Ottawa, Center for Interdisciplinary Nanophysics (Canada)
Dr. Pelling is generally interested in understanding the dynamic mechanical properties of cellular systems across nanometer and micrometer length scales. The mechanical response and transduction pathways of living cells are explored using genetic manipulation and a variety of scanning probe and optical techniques. The long term goals of his research program are to understand the genetic and architectural control mechanisms of mechanotransduction pathways in health and disease.
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Prof. Spencer focuses researches in surface functionalization and characterization, with a particular emphasis on their application in tribology, implant materials, and biosensors. Atomic force microscopy and the surface forces apparatus play an important role in his group, as well as imaging versions of more traditional surface analytical methods, such as XPS and SIMS. Recently, optical and other methods for the in situ measurement of surface-macromolecule interactions have been increasingly emphasized.
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Pierre Schaaf, Inserm UMRS1121/CNRS UPR 22, Université de Strasbourg (France)
Prof. Schaaf focuses on both fundamental aspects of materials for health such as mechanotransduction and more applied issues illustrated by the development of innovative theranostic nanoparticles, dental and laryngo-tracheal implants and personalized biomaterials. Some biomimetic approaches are also developed to design functional materials, for example by using antimicrobial peptides originates from human body to confer antibacterial and antifungal properties on biomaterial surfaces.
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Dennis Discher, Biophysical Eng'g Lab, University of Pennsylvania (United States)
Prof. Discher's research efforts in the nano/bio real range from stem cell-matrix interactions and high-accuracy proteomics to polymer-based nano-delivery of drugs. His lab pioneered studies of stem cell differentiation due to matrix elasticity and Mass Spectrometry approaches to folding at the proteomic scale. His lab has also developed novel degradable cylinders known as filomicelles as well as degradable polymersomes that shrink tumors and treat genetic diseases.
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Georg Fantner, Laboratoire de bio- et nano-instrumentation, EPFL (Switzerland)
Prof. Fantner is expert in time resolved nanocharacterization of biological systems. His special interest is in measuring fundamental processes on bacterial cells, such as cell growth, division and the impact of. To understand the relationship between nanoscale structure and microbiological function we augment AFM information with advanced optical microscopy such as confocal microscopy, super resolution microscopy as well as with time-lapse fluorescent microscopy.
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Noriyuki Kodera, Bio-AFM Frontier Research Center, Kanazawa University (Japan)
Prof. Kodera has completed his Ph.D. in Biophysics at the age of 27 years from Kanazawa University (Toshio Ando’s lab). He has been continuously developing and improving the high-speed atomic force microscope (HS-AFM) since 2000. He is one of staffs of Bio-AFM Frontier Research Center. In 2010, he published a paper showing a walking myosin V along actin filament. After that, he has been applying HS-AFM to various biological phenomena for understanding their functional mechanism.
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SPECIAL GUEST SPEAKER
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Philippe Leclere, Laboratory for Chemistry of Novel Materials, University of Mons (Belgium)
Prof. Leclère received a PhD in Physics from the University of Liège (Belgium) in 1994. From 2000 to 2004, he worked as research associate and served as research coordinator at the Materia Nova Research Center. In October 2004, he became Research Associate of the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research (FRS - FNRS) at the University of Mons. His research interests mostly deal with the characterization by means of scanning probe microscopy techniques of the morphology and the nanoscale properties of organic and hybrid supramolecular (nano)structures, build by self-assembly of functional (macro)molecules.
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