Academic Discipline : Environmental Sciences

Martin Elbel is an Associate Professor at the Department of History, Faculty of Arts, Palacký University in Olomouc. His primary research area is early modern European culture. He has been engaged in the study of the history of the Franciscan Order, investigating its communication strategies and societal interactions. Additionally, his academic interests encompass rituals, magic, and witchcraft, as well as visual culture. He has held visiting fellowships at the Warburg Institute in London, IASH in Edinburgh, and NIAS in Wassenaar, and a visiting professorship at the University of Osaka. Presently, he is working on a project titled Under Ominous Skies: Experiencing Storms in Early Modern Bohemian Lands, which seeks to explore cultural responses to natural hazards in pre-modern society.

Academic Discipline: Molecular Biology, Bioinformatics, Chemoinformatics

Dr. Santi Garcia-Vallvé is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Biotechnology at the Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV). He is a member of the Chemoinformatics and Nutrition Research Group. His research focuses on cheminformatics and computational drug design. He has contributed to the development of several virtual screening procedures aimed at discovering new antidiabetic compounds (such as partial agonists of PPARγ and dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibitors), anti-inflammatory agents targeting IKK2, protein tyrosine phosphatase 1B (PTP1B) inhibitors, and matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) inhibitors. Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, his research has focused on the development of novel SARS-CoV-2 main protease (M-pro) inhibitors and the analysis of SARS-CoV-2 mutations. He is the co-author of more than 80 scientific articles and has been included in the Stanford list (2020–2024) of the world’s top 2% most influential researchers.

Jorge Boczkowski is Professor in Respiratory Medicine at the Université Paris Est Créteil (UPEC), and former Director of the Institut Mondor de Recherche Biomédicale (IMRB, UMR 955 Inserm – UPEC). His research examines the respiratory consequences of exposure to environmental contaminants, notably cigarette smoke and manufactured nanoparticles. Jorge Boczkowski has been coordinator of several research programs in environmental toxicology and has participated in various scientific and expert bodies (CSS 6 Inserm, IReSP “Nanomaterials” Working Group, Scientific Commission of the INERIS Chronic Risks Department, etc).

He was Visiting Professor at Tokyo Metropolitan University (Japan) between 2015 and 2020 and member of the Ethics and Regulatoiry Committee of the “2D-Health” graphene research program at the University of Manchester (UK) between 2017 and 2023. He is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire d’Alfort and has served as an assessor on the Scientific Advisory Board of UPEC (biology and health field) and as a HCERES delegate. He has filed 3 patents and is the author of more 160 publications in peer-reviewed journals.

Roberta Alfano is a Full Professor of Financial and Tax Law at the Law Department of the Università Federico II of Naples.

PhD in Institutions and environmental, financial and tax policies, she directs and participates in several competitive research projects. In particular, she is Coordinator of the Summer School in European Environmental Taxation  (2019/2023) and Summer School in European Environmental Taxation 2.0 (2023/202026) Jean Monnet Module co-financed by the European Commission.

She is the author of several books and publications addressing both substantive and procedural aspects of tax law, with a particular focus on European tax law.

Her core research areas are environmental taxation and European tax law. Her specific research interest includes all areas of environmental taxation, EU tax law, the protection of taxpayers’ rights, gender taxation , tourism taxation and policies, Italian tax law and administrative tax penalties and sports taxation.

Dr. Sarju Sing Rai is an Assistant Professor in “Competencies Development for Societal Transformation through Public Engagement in Transdisciplinary Research and Education” with focus on the themes – Global Health, and Health and Wellbeing (SDG 3). He is member of the Broader mind – Community Service Learning (CSL) project of VU Amsterdam, wherein he is involved in teaching and designing transdisciplinary and transformative education with multistakeholder involvement to jointly address complex (global) health issues. He is also involved in local knowledge alliances with community-based organizations, citizen groups, and educational institutions operating within the city of Amsterdam, viz. Knowledge alliance – Loneliness & Mental Wellbeing, and Knowledge Alliance – Inclusive and accessible City.

Within the Netherlands, he is involved in NRO’s CONNECT project with other 10 Dutch Universities, where he is co-leading activities to elucidate design elements and develop framework(s) for Transdisciplinary Learning in Higher Education. Internationally, he is co-leading the AURORA European Universities Alliance project – workpackage focusing on Teaching and Learning for Societal Impact & Transformation. Sarju is involved in research on Education (competencies development through transdisciplinary education, critical service learning, internationalization and global citizenship) and Global Health topics (health-related stigma reduction and healing; intersectionality, health equity, social justice; loneliness and mental wellbeing; Inclusive living, access and mobility; and systemic transformations).

Academic discipline: Organisation Sciences