Britt Burton-Freeman, Ph.D., Professor and Chair, Department of Food Science and Nutrition and Director, Center for Nutrition Research (CNR), Institute for Food Safety and Health at the Illinois Institute of Technology (Illinois Tech). Dr. Burton-Freeman’s research investigates dietary strategies to address risk factors of cardio-metabolic diseases focusing on plant foods/ingredients and their unique nutritional/phytochemical attributes. Current research characterizes the polyphenol profile of various fruits and spices tracing their metabolic consequences after human ingestion, including the dynamic interaction between the gut metagenome and host genome influencing metabolite pools affecting local and systemic physiology and health status. Dr. Burton-Freeman is actively involved in multiple professional societies dedicated to health and disease abatement, publishes in top journals and is co Editor-in-Chief of Nutrition and Healthy Aging. Dr. Burton-Freeman received her BS in Dietetics from the California State University, Chico, MS and PhD in Nutritional Biology from the University of California, Davis and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of Internal Medicine at University of California, Davis. Dr. Burton-Freeman has held professional appointments in academia and the biotech industry leading research programs and teams to deliver on basic and clinical science objectives.

Scott A. Small MD is the Director of the Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center at Columbia University. Dr. Small’s lab focuses on disorders that effect the hippocampus, a brain circuit targeted by Alzheimer’s disease, schizophrenia, and the normal wear & tear of the aging process (‘cognitive aging’). The lab first developed novel MRI tools applicable to patients and animal models that were used to pinpoint the parts of the hippocampal circuit differentially affected by each disorder (Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 2011). This anatomical information was then used as a guide to uncover pathogenic drivers (Neuron, 2014): Retromer-dependent endosomal recycling in Alzheimer’s disease, dietary flavanols in cognitive aging, and the glutamate metabolic cycle in schizophrenia. Most recently, his lab has been developing interventions and biomarkers for each disorder, and the lab’s discoveries were the cornerstone for the formation of a new biotechnology company, Retromer Therapeutics (https://retromertherapeutics.com/).

Aedín Cassidy is Chair in Nutrition & Preventive Medicine and Director for Interdisciplinary Research at the Institute for Global Food Security, Queen’s University, Belfast. She is currently the Co-Director of a new €35M Co-Centre on Sustainable Food Systems. Her research has focused on determining the relative importance of different flavonoids for health, leading clinical trials, combined with large population-based prospective data, bioavailability and mechanistic studies.

Anandh Babu Pon Velayutham, PhD is an Associate Professor in the Department of Nutrition & Integrative Physiology at the University of Utah. Dr. Velayutham's research focuses on exploring the cardiovascular benefits of blueberries and strawberries and establishing the causal association between dietary berries, gut microbiome, berry-derived microbial metabolites, and vascular health. His lab demonstrated that the gut microbiome is essential for metabolizing the bioactive phytochemicals and mediating the cardiovascular benefits of dietary berries. Dr. Velayutham is an honoree for research excellence at ‘Celebrate U: Showcase of Extraordinary Faculty Achievement.’ He received teaching awards for four consecutive years, including the University of Utah Distinguished Teaching Award 2024, one of the University’s highest annual honors recognizing innovation and excellence in teaching. Dr. Velayutham is a fellow of the University of Utah Academy of Health Science Educators.

Studied Pharmacy at Valencia University (1975-1980) and PhD in 1984. Research Professor of CSIC (Murcia, Spain). He has been visiting scientist in Reading University (UK), Laussane University (Switzerland), Lyon University (France), and UCDavis (USA). His research aims to the study of the role of food polyphenols in human health, their interaction with gut microbiota and their potential in personalized nutrition with a metabolomics approach. He has transferred results of research to industry (six patents of which three have been licensed and derived products are actually in the market). Author of over 400 publications in scientific journals within the fields of phytochemistry, and food science and nutrition (High Impact, H-index = 109 in Web of Science Core).

James L. Kirkland, M.D., Ph.D., a specialist in internal medicine, geriatrics, and endocrinology, is Director of the Center for Advanced Gerotherapeutics at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. He studies cellular senescence, discovered the first agents that selectively eliminate senescent cells - senolytics -, and demonstrated they delay, prevent, or alleviate multiple disorders and diseases in pre-clinical models. He published the first blood biomarker score indicating senescent cell abundance and the first clinical trials of senolytic drugs. He has >320 publications. He is Principal Investigator of the NIH Translational Geroscience Network and is involved in over 85 interventional and observational clinical studies. He was the 2020 recipient of the Irving S. Wright Award of Distinction in Aging Research.

Isabella is a nutritionist with a PhD in Human Nutrition from the University of Brasília and is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Food and Experimental Nutrition at the University of São Paulo (USP), with an internship at the University of California, Davis (USA). Her research focuses on the impact of bioactive compounds found in native Brazilian fruits on human health, particularly in the prevention of cardiometabolic diseases. She is also an active researcher and member of the Passitec Network (Embrapa Cerrados), a collaborative effort aimed at exploring Brazilian biodiversity to develop sustainable agroecological production systems and health-promoting products for consumers.

Pamela Maher received her BSc from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec and her PhD from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, British Columbia. She is currently a Research Professor and head of the Cellular Neurobiology Laboratory at The Salk Institute in La Jolla, CA. Her research interests include models and mechanisms of cell death in aging and neurodegenerative diseases with a specific focus on the oxytosis/ferroptosis regulated cell death pathway. In addition, she works on the characterization and development of natural products for the treatment of acute and chronic neurological disorders such as Alzheimer's disease.

Antonio González-Sarrías is a biologist and work as Tenured Scientist since 2018 at CEBAS-CSIC (Murcia, Spain) and a member of the Food and Health Laboratory. His scientific career has been focused on the evaluation of biological activities, mainly anti-carcinogenic, anti-inflammatory, cardioprotective and neuroprotective properties of different dietary polyphenols and their in vivo metabolites, mainly in preclinical (cell and animal models) studies, thus evaluating whether polyphenols are responsible, at least in part, that a diet rich in fruits and vegetables is correlated with a lower incidence of chronic diseases. He is author/co-author of more than 100 scientific research publications, reviews and book chapters and his H-index is 50. Remarkably, the scientific impact of this research led to be highly-cited researcher in 2020-2021 (Clarivate, Web of Science).

Dr. Cláudia Nunes dos Santos is Principal Investigator at NOVA Medical School. Her research is focused on understanding the role of polyphenols in providing the health benefits associated with consuming bioactive-rich plant foods and understanding the mechanistic basis of these beneficial changes. She is particularly interested in the ability of polyphenols metabolites to reach the brain and prevent or reverse the main hallmarks of neurodegenerative diseases. She received her PhD at University of Lisbon in Plant Biochemistry and conducted her postdoctoral studies at Institute of Technology and Chemistry Biology, Portugal. She was awarded in 2018 with an ERC starting grant for zooming the link between diet and brain health focused in how phenolic metabolites modulate brain inflammation. She was also involved in a series of EU projects as a group leader and work-package leader (FP7-EUBerry; FP7-BacHBerry; Horizon2020-CHIC) and have attracted funding from Portuguese National Agency. She has published over 100 papers in peer-reviewed journals (H-Index of 35, Web of Science).

Diogo Carregosa research aims to investigate the potential of dietary and microbiota metabolites, the low molecular weight phenolic metabolites, to modulate microglia cells and key aspects of neuroinflammation. By doing so, the main hope is to unveil the potential of these molecules to hamper and potentially delay the progression of neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s Disease. Diogo is a shared inventor on a patent application for the use of low molecular weight phenolic metabolites for the treatment and prevention of neurodegenerative diseases. Diogo Carregosa is currently a PhD Student in Biomedicine at NOVA Medical School in Lisbon, Portugal.

Dr. Lichtenstein is the Stanley N. Gershoff Professor of Nutrition Science and Policy at the Friedman School and a senior scientist and director of the Cardiovascular Nutrition Laboratory at the Jean Mayer Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging. She holds secondary appointments as an Associated Faculty member in the Institute for Clinical Research and Health Policy Studies at Tufts Medical Center, and Professor of Medicine at Tufts University School of Medicine. Dr. Lichtenstein received a B.S. from Cornell University, M.S. from Pennsylvania State University, M.S. and D.Sc. from Harvard School of Public health, and post-doctoral training at the Cardiovascular Institute at Boston University School of Medicine. In 2005 she was awarded an honorary doctoral degree from the medical faculty of the University of Eastern Finland. In 2024 she was designated a University Professor at Tufts. Lichtenstein's research group focuses on assessing the interplay between diet and cardiometablic risk. Dr. Lichtenstein has been elected as a fellow of the American Heart Association and American Society of Nutrition. Among others, she has received the David Kritchevsky Career Achievement Award, Conrad A. Elvehjem Award for Public Service and Mentorship Award from American Society for Nutrition; Special Recognition Award, Distinguished Achievement Award, Mentor of Women Award and Award of Meritorious Achievement from the American Heart Association; Excellence in Dietary Guidance Award from the American Public Health Association. She has served on two Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committees for USDA and HHS. She currently serves as the Editor-in-Chief of the Tufts University Health & Nutrition Letter.