Speakers

Dzihan Abazovic, is a physician and researcher working in the field of regenerative medicine, cellular and subcellular therapies, and longevity medicine. His work focuses on the clinical and translational application of advanced regenerative technologies including bone marrow aspirate concentrate (BMAC), platelet‑rich plasma (PRP), exosome‑based therapies, mitochondrial transfer, and blood purification protocols. He actively participates in international scientific congresses and collaborations focused on the integration of regenerative medicine into preventive and longevity‑oriented healthcare models.

Prof. Dr. Terin Adali is a Professor of Biomedical Engineering whose research lies at the intersection of biomaterials science, tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, biosensor technologies, nanomedicine, and artificial intelligence applications in healthcare. With a multidisciplinary background in chemistry and biomedical engineering, she has developed an internationally recognized research portfolio focused on the design, characterization, and biomedical translation of advanced natural-polymer-based systems for healthcare applications. Her studies have explored the use of silk fibroin in biofilms, scaffolds, microparticles, nanoparticles, hydrogels, and hybrid biomaterial constructs, demonstrating their potential in tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, drug delivery, and blood-contacting medical devices.

He graduated from Ankara University, Faculty of Pharmacy in 1987 with honors. He had Master of Science degree in 1992 and Ph.D. Degree in 1997 at the Department of Toxicology at Gülhane Military Medical Academy. He became Associate Professor in Toxicology in 1999 and Professor in 2008. He represented Turkish Army in NATO Working Group on Military Medical Material and Military Pharmacy for 10 years. He started his new career at Yeditepe University in 2010. He became Vice Rector for Yeditepe University between 2012-2024. He has above 189 research paper published at international journals. He has also poster and oral presentations at different congress. His papers were cited above 3900 times. His H index is 37. He conducted a lot of research projects. His main research topics are oxidative stress, heavy metal toxicity, risk assessment, biocompatibility tests for medical devices and safety evaluation of drugs and medical devices. He teaches Toxicology at Faculty of Pharmacy. He is a member of Turkish Society of Toxicology and EUROTOX. He has rights and honors of European Registered Toxicologist (ERT). Actually he works for Yeditepe University as Head of Department of Toxicology and Director of Yeditepe University, Faculty of Pharmacy Drug, Cosmetic and Medical Device R&D Laboratory (YEUF-İKTAL).

Professor and Head, Tissue Engineering, Biomaterials & Nanobiotechnology Laboratory, Ankara University Faculty of Science, Department of Chemistry (Biochemistry), Ankara, Türkiye
President, Biomaterials & Tissue Engineering Society (BTES Türkiye)
Founding Deputy Director, AU Stem Cell Institute (2010-2016)
Recipient of major awards: e.g. Ankara University Science Award (2008), METU Parlar Science Award (2018); Doktorclub 2019 Biotechnology & Genome Technology Award (2019)
Inventor of seven patents; founder of a startup company, Biovalda Health Technologies, Inc.
Supervisor of >55 post-graduate studies
Section Editor (Musculoskeletal Regeneration & Tissue Engineering): Stem Cell Reviews & Reports [SpringerNature]
Editor: Biofabrication in Regenerative Medicine [SpringerNature] Book series: Stem Cell Biology & Regenerative Medicine (upcoming 2026)
EB Member: Genes & Diseases (Elsevier); Molecular Biotechnology (Springer); Cell Biology and Translational Medicine [Subseries of AEMB] (Springer)
Listed in “Stanford U./Elsevier's World’s High Impact Scientists” Career-Long Impact List (2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025)

Christopher H. Evans, PhD, DSc, is the John and Posy Krehbiel Professor of Orthopedics at the Mayo Clinic, with the academic rank of Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Orthopedic Surgery and Molecular Medicine in the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science.

Dr. Evans earned BSc, PhD and DSc degrees in genetics, microbiology and biochemistry at the University of Wales, United Kingdom. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship in molecular biology at Free University of Brussels, Belgium and earned a MA in the history and philosophy of science at the University of Pittsburgh. He has an honorary MA from Harvard Medical School, where he is the Maurice Müller Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery Emeritus.

A former President of the Orthopaedic Research Society, Dr. Evans is a fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Royal College of Pathologists, the Orthopaedic Research Society, International Orthopaedic Research and the Learned Society of Wales. He is also an honorary member of the Croatian Orthopaedic Society and an honorary fellow of Swansea University. He has won a number of awards, most recently the 2025 Outstanding Achievement in Mentoring Award from the Orthopaedic Research Society. He is a co-founder of the arthritis gene therapy company Genascence Corp.

Manuela E. Gomes is a Full Professor of Bioengineering at the Institute for Medical and Biomedical Sciences (ICBAS), University of Porto, and leads the Regenerative Medicine & 3D Tissue Modelling research group at UMIB (ICBAS). Her research focuses on tissue engineering and regenerative medicine, including magnetic‑stimulus strategies to develop anisotropic scaffolds and bioinks that guide stem‑cell differentiation and modulate inflammation—particularly for tendon regeneration—and related approaches for musculoskeletal tumour modelling.

She has coordinated and contributed to numerous European and national projects (including an ERC Consolidator Grant), and has mentored a broad cohort of trainees (27 MSc, 23 PhD, and 22 post‑doctoral researchers). She has authored ~250 peer‑reviewed journal papers, 47 book chapters, edited multiple reference works, and is co‑author of 9 patent families, with extensive invited lectures and conference communications. Her publications have received 12,000+ citations (Web of Science h‑index 62; Google Scholar h‑index 80).

She currently serves as Chair of TERMIS‑EU (European Chapter) and is Ambassador to Portugal of the European Orthopaedic Research Society (EORS). ORCID: 0000‑0002‑2036‑6291.

Professor Nesrin Hasirci is actively working at Middle East Technical University (METU) BIOMATEN Center of Excellence in Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering (Ankara), and Near East University Bioengineering Department (Lefkosa, TRNC) as a faculty member. Prof. Hasirci has more than 250 scientific publications, has 4 patents, 22 chapters in scientific books, 3 text book about fundamentals of Biomaterials, and 5 edited books. She presented more 500 talks on international and national congresses, conferences and symposia and in many of them she was invited or plenary lecturer. She supervised and/or co-supervised more than 50 M.Sc. and 20 Ph.D. theses. Prof. Hasirci worked as Head of newly established Graduate Departments at METU. She is the establisher and the first Head of the Graduate Department of Biomedical Engineering, and have been the Head of the Graduate Department of Biotechnology two times at different periods. She also administered as Vice Chairman of the Chemistry Department in 1990s. In the years of 1994-1995, she had been at
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Department of Chemical Engineering, Cambridge, USA, as Fulbright Visiting Professor granted by Fulbright Commission. Prof. Hasirci is a member of the ESF Pool of Reviewers, and has been as reviewer in Horizon, FP-6 and FP-7 EU, COST and ERA-EuroNanoMed projects, as well as many National and International projects and manuscripts submitted to National and International organizations and journals.
Prof Hasirci is member of many societies as: ESB-European Society for Biomaterials (EU); TERMIS- Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine; Controlled Release Society; Polymer Science and Technology (Türkiye); Chemistry (Türkiye); Fulbright Alumni Association (Türkiye). She received the University Awards in betwwen 2001-2016 in every year given to the successful scientists of the previous year. She is the owner of ‘Science Award’ given by M. Parlar Foundation and ‘Technology Award’ given by Elginkan Foundation (Türkiye). She is Honorary Member of ESB-European Society of Biomaterials (EU), and Fellow of the Science Academy (Türkiye).

Prof. Vasif Nejat Hasırcı received his B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Chemistry from Middle East Technical University (METU) in 1971 and 1973, and Ph.D. at the University of Reading, United Kingdom, in 1976. He then joined METU Department of Life Sciences (which later became two departments, Biology and Molecular Biology). He became Associate Professor in 1982 and Professor in 1998. He served as a member of the Ministry of Education of Turkey, Science Lycees Committee and also as the Group leader at TUBITAK (Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey). During his academic career, he was selected as a Fulbright Fellow to do research at Drexel University Biomedical Engineering Institute and Materials Eng. Dept. (Philadelphia,USA) (1982–1984) and later at Northeastern University (Boston USA) (1998–1999). He is the Founding Director of BIOMATEN, METU Center of Excellence in Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering (2011). He served at Acıbadem Mehmet Ali Aydınlar University, Department of Biomedical Engineering and as Founding Chair of Graduate Department
of Biomaterials where he also served as Founding Director of Acibadem University Biomaterials Center (2020). His in situ, in vitro and in vivo research involves biomaterials, tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, drug delivery systems, and biomedical polymers. Throughout his career, he has supervised around 80 M.Sc. and Ph.D. students in these fields, funded mostly through his national and international research projects. He is a Honorary Fellow of the European Biomaterials Society (ESB), Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC, UK) and a Fellow of the International Union of Societies of Biomaterials Science and Engineering (FBSE, IUSBSE). At the national level, he is the Founding President of the Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering Society (BDMD, Turkey), and a founder of the BIOMEDs (Biomedical Science and Technology Symposia, Turkey), the main symposium series in this field in the country.

Prof. Hwanf received a Bachelor of Engineering degree in Biomedical Engineering with a concentration in Computer Science and a minor in Materials Science and Engineering from Johns Hopkins University in 2002. He then completed his Ph.D. in Medicine in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in 2008. Following his doctoral studies, he worked as a Visiting Scientist in the Department of Bioengineering at the University of California, San Diego, and later as a Postdoctoral Associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the Robert Langer Laboratory between 2008 and 2011. In 2011, he joined Seoul National University as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2015. During this period, he also served as a Visiting Associate Professor at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in 2018. Since 2020, he has been a Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Seoul National University.
His research interests include direct cellular reprogramming, the development of injectable and adhesive hydrogels for tissue engineering applications, and cell caging systems for immunological camouflage.

Prof. Gilson Khang received his B.S. and M.S. degrees from Inha University, Republic of Korea, and completed his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Iowa, USA, in 1995. Prior to his academic career, he conducted biomaterials research at the Korea Research Institute of Chemical Technology (KRICT). He later joined Chonbuk National University, where he established his academic career in polymer science, biomaterials, and tissue engineering and became a Full Professor.

His research focuses on biomaterials, tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, and the development of functional scaffolds for biomedical applications. His work has addressed cell–polymer interactions, synthetic and natural hybrid biomaterials, and scaffold-based approaches for the regeneration of tissues including bone, cartilage, intervertebral disc, and neural tissues. He has also contributed to major Korean research initiatives, including the Brain Korea 21 (BK-21) and World Class University (WCU) programs.

Prof. Khang has played an active role in the development of the tissue engineering community in Asia. He was among the founding members of the Asian Tissue Engineering Society (ATES) and the Asia-Pacific Chapter of the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS-AP), where he has held leadership positions. His longstanding contributions span biomaterials science, tissue engineering, and regenerative medicine, with a strong emphasis on translating polymer-based biomaterials into strategies for tissue regeneration.

Prof. Seda Kızılel received her B.S. and M.S. degrees in Chemical Engineering from Boğaziçi University and completed her Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering at the Illinois Institute of Technology, USA, in 2004. She subsequently conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Chicago between 2004 and 2007. She joined the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Koç University in 2008, became Associate Professor in 2014, and has been serving as Professor since 2022. She has also held visiting faculty positions at the University of Chicago and the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems.

Her research focuses on regenerative medicine, functional biomaterials, immunomodulation, tissue engineering, drug delivery systems, and biomedical nanotechnology. She is the Director of the Biomimetic Materials, Cell and Tissue Engineering Laboratory at Koç University, where her group develops innovative biomaterial and hydrogel-based systems for therapeutic and regenerative applications.

Prof. Kızılel has served as principal investigator in numerous TÜBİTAK-, EU-, and industry-funded research projects and has authored more than 100 international scientific publications and over 10 patents. Her work has received several national and international awards. She was elected as a member of the Science Academy (Bilim Akademisi) in 2025 and received the 2025 Elginkan Foundation Technology Award for her work on innovative biomaterial technologies.

Prof. Reha Ş. Kişnişci completed his DDS at Ankara University Faculty of Dentistry (1979–1984) and earned his PhD in Clinical Sciences at the same institution (1984–1987). His doctoral thesis investigated experimentally applied inverted dermal grafts for intraoral defects, including clinical, histopathological, and electron‑microscopic evaluations.

He has served in academic leadership and senior faculty roles for decades, including Professor at Ankara University Faculty of Dentistry (1997–2021). He is currently Professor at Lokman Hekim University Faculty of Dentistry, Department of Clinical Sciences (2021–present), where he also serves as Head of Department / Division.

Bahattin Koc is a Professor of Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences at Sabancı University. His research spans 3D bioprinting, computational biomodelling, nano/micro-scale manufacturing and, additive manufacturing. He has published over 100 papers, holds three patents, and has received major honors including the Elginkan Foundation Science and Technology Award, the Turkish Heart Association Award, and the Marie Curie Career Integration Award, with research funding exceeding million.

Feza Korkusuz MD attended medical specialization in Orthopedic Surgery and Traumatology at Gazi University Medical Faculty, Department of Orthopedic Surgery and Traumatology between 1987 and 1992, after graduating from Ankara University Medical Faculty in 1986. Between 1989 and 1990 he studied in Osaka University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Orthopaedic Surgery from where he graduated with a postgraduate diploma. His clinical and research focused on Spine Surgery, Sports Medicine and Basic Sciences. Dr. Korkusuz worked at the Middle East Technical University (METU) as an orthopedic surgeon and Medical Director at the Medical Center, and at the Department of Physical Education and Sports as the Head of the Department until 2013. In 1994 and in 2001 he became Associate Professor and Professor. In 1999 and 2000, he received the METU Prof. Dr. N. Parlar Foundation young investigator
and the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK) Promotion Award in Medical Sciences.
Between 1991 and 2016, he was a member to the Orthopaedic Research Society. In 2008 he became an active member of the Association of Bone and Joint Surgeons (ABJS), and since 2006 he has been the corresponding and deputy editor of Clinical Orthopaedics and Related Research (CORR). In 2017, he became an active member to the Turkish Academy of Science (TUBA). He was the Advisor to the President of TÜBİTAK between 2018 and 2021. He currently is the Chairman of the Department of Hacettepe University Medical Faculty, Department of Sports Medicine. His current research interests are motion analysis, multi-omics, novel biosensors for osteoarthritis diagnosis and new therapeutics delivery using micro-needles.

Julietta V. Rau (Dr., PhD) is Director of Research and head of a laboratory and research group at the Institute of the Structure of Matter of the Italian National Research Council (ISM-CNR, Rome, Italy). She has authored 240+ peer‑reviewed journal articles, delivered ~200 conference presentations, and given 45 invited/plenary/keynote talks, and holds 3 international patents (h‑index 48; ~7,000 citations on Google Scholar).

She has received multiple international awards and serves as Chair and organizer of the biennial BioMaH “Biomaterials for Healthcare” International Conference. She is also an Ambassador for Italy at the European Orthopaedic Research Society and an Honorary Member of the Romanian Society for Biomaterials.

Her editorial roles include Associate Editor (Bioactive Materials; Frontiers in Biomaterials Science) and Editorial Board Member for several journals. Her current research focuses on innovative biomaterials for regenerative medicine, orthopaedics and dentistry—especially calcium phosphates and bioactive glasses for tissue engineering—along with antibacterial implant surfaces, novel imaging approaches for cancer diagnostics, and biodegradable alloys/coatings.

Dr. Yasuhiko Tabata is Professor Emeritus at Kyoto University and Special Professor leading the Cell Biotechnology Group in the Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, Graduate School of Medicine.

He received his degrees in polymer chemistry, technology, medical science, and pharmaceutical science from Kyoto University and was a visiting scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) under Prof. Robert Langer. He is an internationally recognized researcher in biomaterials and regenerative medicine, with more than 1,700 scientific publications and over 140 patents. His interdisciplinary work integrates polymer chemistry, pharmaceutical sciences, biology, and clinical medicine, focusing on biomaterials design, drug delivery systems, tissue engineering, stem cell technology, and translational regenerative therapies.

Prof. Tabata has received numerous prestigious national and international awards and has held leadership roles in major scientific societies, including the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS-AP) and the Japan Society of Drug Delivery System. He has actively contributed to advancing translational research by fostering collaborations between academia, clinical practice, and industry to develop innovative regenerative medicine strategies and biomedical applications.