Åsa Gustafsson is a Professor at the Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of California San Diego (UCSD) and the Director of the Division of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Diseases. Dr. Gustafsson is interested in understanding the molecular pathways that regulate the life and death of cardiac myocytes. Activation of cell death pathways is a common occurrence in cardiovascular disease and contributes to the development of heart failure. Her research is focused on elucidating pathways involved in regulating mitochondrial function and degradation in myocardial cells. She is also interested in alternative mechanisms of mitochondrial quality control in cells. Defects in these pathways lead to the accumulation of aberrant mitochondria and loss of cardiac myocytes. Her lab utilizes molecular and genetic approaches to identify and perturb specific regulators of mitochondrial function and autophagy in mice and cells. Dr. Gustafsson joined the Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences in October 2009. Prior to coming to UCSD, she was an Assistant Professor at San Diego State University. She received her Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences from the Department of Pharmacology at UCSD in 2001. Her postdoctoral training was done at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla with Dr. Roberta Gottlieb. For her contributions to cardiovascular research, she was awarded the ISHR Outstanding Investigator Award in 2014. She is also an elected Fellow of the American Heart Association and a Fellow of the International Society for Heart Research. She is the President-Elect of the International Society for Heart Research.

Tracey Gaspari leads the IRAP Pharmacology Group in the Biomedical Discovery Institute, Monash University. She is internationally recognized as a leading authority on biological targeting of the enzyme, IRAP, particularly in the context of CVD. Her translational research program is focused on developing new treatment strategies for arresting progression of fibrotic end organ diseases. She is co-founder of Inosi Therapeutics, a spin-out company currently developing novel IRAP inhibitors to treat difficult-to-reverse fibrosis.

Dr Weeks leads the Cardiac Signalling & Metabolism Group in the Department of Anatomy & Physiology and the Baker Department of Cardiometabolic Health at the University of Melbourne. The goal of her research is to identify novel drug targets for the treatment of cardiometabolic diseases, by investigating the molecular mechanisms that contribute to cardiac growth, remodelling and dysfunction in experimental models of heart failure, diabetes and chemotherapy-induced cardiotoxicity. Dr Weeks was awarded a PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Melbourne in 2012, which she completed at the Baker Heart & Diabetes Institute under the supervision of Prof Julie McMullen. After her PhD, she was awarded a highly competitive Heart Foundation Overseas Research Scholarship to undertake postdoctoral research in Prof Metin Avkiran’s laboratory at King’s College London. Following her return to Australia, Dr Weeks was awarded an Emerging Leader Fellowship from the Baker Institute and The Shine On Foundation to support her research into the function of protein phosphatases, a family of enzymes that are having a renaissance as potential drug targets in multiple disease settings. In 2022, Dr Weeks relocated to the University of Melbourne and established the Cardiac Signalling & Metabolism Group. Her group uses in vivo mouse models, cell culture systems, molecular biology approaches and omic technologies to characterise novel signalling mechanisms that contribute to cardiac remodelling and dysfunction in cardiometabolic disease settings, including heart failure, type II diabetes and cardiotoxicity. Dr Weeks’ research is currently supported by a Heart Foundation Future Leader Fellowship and project grants from the Heart Foundation, Diabetes Australia and the Sir Edward Dunlop Medical Research Foundation.

Mauro Giacca, MD PhD, is Past-President of the ISHR-ES. He is Head of the School of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Medicine&Sciences at King’s College London, UK and Director of the Centre of Excellence for Advanced Therapies for Cardiac Repair and Regeneration (RECREATE) of the Medical Research Council, UK. Until 2019, he has served as Director-General of ICGEB, a United Nations organization. Since 2005, he is Full Professor of Molecular Biology at the University of Trieste, Italy. He is the founder of Forcefield Therapeutics and Heqet Therapeutics, two startups that develop advanced therapies for myocardial infarction and heart failure. Prof Giacca is an elected Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, UK and of ISHR.

Dr Kristen Bubb is the lead of the Translational Vascular Therapeutics Group at Monash University Biomedicine Discovery Institute and Victorian Heart Institute. Her work is focused on identifying new treatments for vascular diseases by understanding the fundamental vascular pathophysiology. Dr Bubb has focused on pulmonary hypertension which drives right ventricle failure and has published work on multiple potential novel therapies, in addition to leading methodology development for right ventricle pressure and imaging measurements in mice. She is also leading studies into peripheral artery disease, atherosclerosis progression and and hypertension/left ventricle failure in humans.