Dr Valentín Fuster

The cardiologist Valentín Fuster is the General Director of the Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares Carlos III (CNIC) in Madrid and Director of the Cardiovascular Institute, and Physician-in-Chief at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. His accomplishments as physician and scientist in translational medicine has granted him several prestigious international awards due to their high impact in the improvement of prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of cardiovascular diseases. In addition, Dr. Fuster is strongly committed to scientific divulgation and to promote healthy habits, which led him to the creation of the Science, Health and Education Foundation (SHE).

Dr Gonzalo G. de Polavieja

Gonzalo G. de Polavieja obtained his PhD in Physical Sciences as ‘Marie Curie’ fellow (Oxford, UK) at Mark S. Child´s group. He performed a postdoc in Neurobiology as ‘Welcome Trust’ fellow in Mathematical Biology at the Laughlin´s Laboratory (Cambridge, UK). In 2002, he obtained a Grass Fellowship in Neurobiology at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole. Shortly after he was awarded with a ‘Ramon y Cajal’ fellowship (Theoretical Physics, UAM). Presently, he is a staff scientist at the Cajal Institute (CSIC, Spain).
Polavieja and colleagues have been several times focus of media attention, for example for their researchs in animal behavior or a 3D reconstruction of Drosophilla´s brain. For more information visit his website: www.neural-circuits.org/

Dr Joan J. Guinovart

Professor Joan J. Guinovart is the Director of the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona) since 2001 and member of several committees of the International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (IUBMB). His commitment in defense of science in Spain led him to become President of the Confederation of Spanish Scientific Societies (COSCE) and the Spanish National Committee of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Moreover, he is Chief Editor of SEBBM magazine and editor IUBMB Life. In addition, he is group leader of a laboratory involved in several projects on glycogen metabolism and its dysfunctions in diabetes and Lafora disease.

Dr Peter Bryant

Peter Bryant joined Instituto de Empresa’s Entrepreneurship Faculty in 2009, having earned his PhD in 2006 from the Macquarie Graduate School of Management in Sydney, Australia. His research focuses on the origin and evolution of entrepreneurial organizations, their capabilities and strategies. Peter explains: “I am fascinated by the initial conditions of entrepreneurial organizations. I want to understand what happens when diverse individuals join forces to pursue a collective dream.”

Dr Alonso Mateos

Dr Alonso Mateos will share with us the importance of conecting basic science and translational medicine, with the Metocard project as an exaple of applying basic science discoveries in the field. He has lead the SUMA 112 educational project, which has recieved the Medical educational award in 2013 from UCM-Lilly foundation. The project provides medical residents with a training in emergency situations.

Dr Capitolina Díaz

Capitolina Díaz, PhD in Sociology, University of London. Currently, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Valencia (Spain) and President of the Spanish Association of Women in Science and Technology (AMIT). Main fields of research: Sociology of gender, Sociology of Education and Gender globalization. Author of more than 90 papers, chapters and books. Researcher in 15 projects (national and international). Director of 5 doctoral theses. Member of 6 editorial boards. Invited scholar at the universities of Stanford and Harvard (US), UNAM and UAM (México), Comahue (Argentina) and Moa (Cuba). Previous positions: Planning Director of the University of  Oviedo; Director of the Women and Science Unit (Ministry of Science and Education), Research Counselor in the Spanish Permanent Representation in front of the EU, General Director of Equality in Employment (Ministry of Equality).

Dr Cristina Balbás

Cristina Balbás Martínez graduated from Princeton University with a BA in Molecular Biology in 2010. She just completed her PhD at the Spanish National Cancer Research Centre (CNIO), studying cohesin component STAG2 mutations in the context of bladder cancer. She is also the president of Escuelab (www.escuelab.es), a non-profit organization that creates multimedia educational materials about scientific topics and implements them at schools in the form of interactive workshops.

Dr M. Álvaro Berbís

M. Alvaro Berbís holds B.S. (Hons) in Biochemistry (2010) and M.S. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (2011) from the Complutense University of Madrid. He also performed undergraduate studies in Chemistry at the University of Hamburg (2007-2008), where he worked as a visiting researcher at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf. He obtained his Ph.D. in Biochemistry (2014) at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), where his research focuses on the development of NMR spectroscopy techniques for the study of molecular recognition processes and drug discovery. As part of his doctoral studies, he was a visiting graduate at The Scripps Research Institute (La Jolla, CA, U.S.A.). From 2013, Dr. Berbís combines his research activities with his involvement in MIT Enterprise Forum Spain, where he participates in the management of a number of programs dedicated to fostering technology transfer and tech-based entrepreneurship.

Dr Carlos del Fresno

“Hello everyone, my name is Carlos del Fresno; I am a PhD working at CNIC in David Sancho’s group. I was born in Santa Cruz de Mudela, a small village in “la Mancha”. I performed my primary studies and high school there and in 1998 I moved to Madrid to study Biology in Complutense University. There, I started my research activity collaborating in the Microbiology department. In 2003 I joined Dr. López-Collazo’s lab in La Paz Hospital to do my PhD. It was there, in 2006, where we created EMPIREO Molecular Diagnostic. During this time, I performed a couple of short stays in Italy, both in Milan at the Mario Negri Institute and in Brescia at the Università degli Studi, under the supervision of Dr. Sozzani. In 2008 I moved to National Centre of Biotechnology for a first postdoc stage in Dr. Ardavín’s lab. Eventually, in 2012, I came to CNIC for a second postdoc.”

Dr Ana Cuadrado

Dr. Ana Cuadrado holds her Master’s degree in Biology, Universidad de Oviedo, Spain (1995), and got her PhD in Biology, by Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain in 2000. From 2001 to 2003 she worked as a Scientific Investigator in PharmaMar SA, (Madrid, Spain) to move later to Heidelberg, Germany to do her postdoctoral stay in Angel Nebreda´s lab (2003). In 2004 the whole lab moved to CNIC (Madrid, Spain) where she became a staff scientist (until 2010) and got a Ramón y Cajal Fellow (to date). In 2013 she did a Master in “Management Fundamentals for Scientists and Researchers”, IE, Madrid where she found the perfect environment to transform her passion for cancer research, as well as her personal experience and attitude in life into a tangible product that could actually help to those suffering from this disease.  Ana is co-founder of the  e-nlaza platform, which is being cooked in the Area31 Startup incubator at the IE, and granted by the Mutua Madrileña Foundation. Ana continues working in Academia while she is deeply involved in e-nlaza development.