Dr. Pantaleo is the Chief of the Laboratory of AIDS Immunopathogenesis at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois (CHUV), University of Lausanne, Switzerland. During the past fifteen years, Professor Pantaleo’s research has been focused on the delineation of the immunopathogenesis of HIV infection and of other viral infections such as cytomegalovirus and hepatitis C virus. His research activities have been focused on human T cell cloning, human T cell phenotypic and functional analysis, T cell activation, differentiation and memory, immunopathogenesis of HIV infection, HIV distribution in different anatomic compartments, antiretroviral therapy, immune reconstitution after antiretroviral therapy, immune-based therapeutic strategies and vaccines. Professor Pantaleo is author and co-author of more than 200 publications in international scientific journals.

Dr. Pollard is a professor of Microbiology and Internal Medicine at the University of California. He has also been Chief, Division of Infectious Diseases since 2002. Dr Pollard’s research interests are focused on the pathogenesis of HIV infection and complicating viruses. His laboratory conducts studies of human immune responses to HIV in patients on clinical trials using antiretrovirals or immunomodulating agents. The laboratory also conducts studies measuring immune responses of mucosal tissues such as those from gut biopsies and comparing those to those from the peripheral blood compartment. The laboratory is also focusing on differing immune responses in minority subject and in women. He has been an author on more than 200 scientific publications.

Jürgen Rockstroh is a Professor of Medicine at the University of Bonn and has been Head of a HIV outpatient clinic since 1995. He is an investigator from various protease inhibitor studies and has considerable experience with various antiretroviral drug regimens and clinical trialsfor treatment of HIV and hepatitis co-infection. He has been elected chair of the KAAD (German Clinical AIDS Working Group) since 1998.Jürgen Rockstroh's department treats the world's largest cohort of HIV-infected haemophiliacs. His research interests encompass protease inhibitor therapy, including dual regimens, the course of HIV disease in haemophiliacs, HIV/HCV co-infection, and cytokines and apoptosis before and after antiretroviral therapy. He is a prolific speaker at international conferences and has published more than
100 articles and book chapters.

Dag Kvale is Professor of Medicine at the Department of Infectious Diseases Ullevål at Oslo University Hospital. He is originally trained as a mucosal immunologist but started clinical education with HIV-infected patients in 1988. Kvale has been PI on two of the Bionor Immuno-sponsored studies with therapeutic HIV vaccines, one (Vacc-4x) which formed the basis for the extension of the Vacc-4x study into the ongoing multicentre trial. With Bionor Immuno as one of several key partners, Kvale also heads two grants from Research Council of Norway to investigate optimization of peptide-based regimen and to conduct clinical studies on alternative immune modulation in patients with untreated chronic HIV infection, respectively. Kvale has published about 80 scientific papers on immunological topics and HIV/AIDS.

Since the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, Dr. Gazzard has been physician in charge of inpatient care for the HIV/GUM Unit of Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, the largest AIDS unit in England. He is a member of the MRC Clinical Trials Committee and a number of other international steering committees that coordinate antiretroviral studies across Europe, Australia, and North America.  He was Principal Investigator for the largest combination antiretroviral therapy (ART) trial. He sits on the Steering Committee in charge of the bi-annual European AIDS meetings and is a member of the Scientific Committee of the World AIDS Congress, a council member of the European AIDS Association, and a trustee of the British Medical Association AIDS Foundation.Dr. Gazzard is published in more than 300 peer-reviewed publications on topics such as HIV, general medicine, infectious disease, and gastroenterology. He has authored more than 30 chapters in books on the same subjects and has edited five books on gastroenterology and HIV disease. He is on the editorial boards of the International Journal of STD & AIDS and Drugs. He regularly reviews articles for publications such as AIDS, the Journal of Medical Ethics and the British Medical Journal.Dr. Gazzard has earned numerous awards, including the Todd Prize in Medicine, the Legg Prize in surgery, and the Ware Prize in Pathology. He received his M.D. from the University of Cambridge.

 

Dr Peters is Head of the Academic Unit of HIV & STDs at the Guys & St Thomas' site of Kings College London. He has 20 years of clinical experience of managing people with HIV infection, he has a large NHS clinical HIV practice, and co-authors the British HIV Adult Treatment Guidelines for adults with HIV infection. He set up and runs a clinical trials unit for HIV therapies and HIV vaccines, based at St Thomas' Hospital. The unit has experience of HIV vaccine design, both immunotherapeutic and prophylactic, and amongst several studies is a recently completed large Phase 2 study on a prophylactic DNA HIV vaccine, sponsored by IAVI.Dr Peters was attached to the HIV vaccine unit at the WHO during 2006 for 6 months, and helped develop Phase 2B designs, in conjunction with IAVI, NIH, CDC etc.

Dr. Redfield is a professor of University of Baltimore and is Head of the Infectious Diseases Division at Univesity of Maryland. Dr. Redfield co-founded the Institute of Human Virology based at Maryland, together with his HIV research colleague Dr. Robert Gallo, the co-discoverer of the HIV retrovirus. Furthermore Prof Redfield have been chair of International Sub Committee to the Presidents Advisory Committee on HIV AIDS.

Gus Dalgleish has been Professor of Oncology at St. George's University of London since 1991.  He has been involved with HIV research since the first descriptions of AIDS. Working as a clinical fellow with Robin Weiss he described the use of CD4 as the main receptor for HIV and was the first to associate HIV with the outbreak of SLIM disease in Uganda. His main interest is the pathogenesis of HIV that has to induce immune activation before the infection can proceed to clinical AIDS. His group was the first to suggest that the C5 region of gp120 could act as if it were a foreign transplant antigen (alloepitope) and induce the activation that precedes AIDS and also to suggest it as a potential therapeutic target. Professor Dalgleish has also pioneered the use of cancer vaccines and is principal of the Cancer Vaccine Institute and has been principal and clinical investigator on numerous vaccine trials. He has published over 300 peer reviewed papers and co-edited five books including HIV and the New Viruses and Tumor Immunology, as well as numerous book chapters.