Speakers




Jeong Ha Kim

Traditional exploitation of Korean kelp species: food, feed, medicinal uses and conservation
Jeong Ha Kim is Professor at the Department of Biological Sciences (Sungkyunkwan University, Korea). He obtained his MSc degree at the Western Illinois University (USA) and his PhD degree at Univ. of British Columbia (Canada). He is the President, Korean Society of Phycology, Vice President of the Korean Society of Phycology, Treasurer of the Asian Pacific Phycological Association, member of the Executive Committee of the Korean Cultural Heritage Administration, Associate editor of Phycological Research and Algae. He has been the Chair of National Organizing Committee of 2019 International Seaweed Symposium, and Wando International Marine Algae Symposium.


Deniz Tasdemir

Chemical ecology and drug discovery studies on Baltic brown algae and their microbiome
Deniz Tasdemir is a full professor of marine natural products chemistry at GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel (Germany). Currently she leads the Research Unit Marine Natural Products Chemistry and is the director of GEOMAR Centre for Marine Biotechnology (GEOMAR-Biotech). She obtained her PhD degree at ETH-Zurich (Switzerland) followed by a post- doctoral training on sponge-derived anticancer compounds at University of Utah (USA). She was then senior lecturer at University of London and full professor at National University of Ireland Galway. Her research interests include marine biotechnology with focus on marine biodiscovery, and chemical ecology. She applies integrated metabolomics, OSMAC, microbial co-cultivation and imaging mass spectrometry (DESI-IMS) techniques as research tools on marine invertebrates, seaweeds and microorganisms from temperate and extreme environments.

Prof. Tasdemir is the author of over 120 publications, reviews, book chapters and several patents. She serves in the editorial board of several international journals including Marine Drugs. Prof. Tasdemir is the recipient of many distinctions and prestigious awards, e.g. Pierre Fabre Prize (Phytochemical Society of Europe, 2004), Egon-Stahl Silver Medal (Society for Medicinal Plant Research and Natural Products, 2005) and Waters Award for Excellence in Natural Product Innovation (2016). She has been leading the Interreg BSR projects Baltic Blue Biotechnology Alliance and ALLIANCE+. She is partner of four other EU projects BLUEandGREEN, MarPipe, FucoSan and SUMMER.

Alan T Critchley

2020 vision: a phyconomic approach to supplying the global, future needs for seaweeds of commercial interest.
Graduate of Portsmouth Polytechnic (Univ.), UK. Cut my knees (learned my craft) as an ecologist studying rocky shores and marine invasives. An academic career took me to Southern Africa (Pietermaritzburg, Johannesburg, RSA and Windhoek, Namibia). Moved to applied and industrial applications of seaweeds when working for Degussa (now Cargill) Texturant Solutions, Normandy, France in their New Raw Materials laboratory. Canada then called for a position leading a diverse and exceptional research team, networking with university,government and private researchers for an SME producer of various seaweed products.

Currently affiliated with the Verschuren Centre for Sustainability in Energy and Environment at Cape Breton Univ. reviewing research in Marine Biology, Botany and Phycology. Recently published a book for Springer on the cultivation/utilisation of Kappaphycus and Eucheuma seaweeds (“Tropical Seaweed Farming” -Springer) with Drs Anicia Hurtado and Iain Neish as co- editors. Established applied research interests in the pests and diseases of cultivated seaweeds entitled: SEECS - "Seaweed extracts for the enhanced cultivation of seaweeds". On-going co- editing with colleagues such as: Anicia Hurtado, Leonel Pereira, Lynn Cornish, Danilo Largo and Nicholas Paul in special issues – “Seaweed Resources of The World: A 2020 Vision” for Botanica Marina and “Concise Reviews of Seaweeds of Commercial Interest” for Journal of Applied Phycology.

Félix L. Figueroa

Cosmeceutics and blue biotechnology with marine algae and cyanobacteria
Félix L. Figueroa is Full Professor of Ecology in Málaga University. Member of the Research group Photobiology and Biotechnology of aquatic organisms (FYBOA-RNM 295) and Institute for Blue Biotechnology and Development (IBYDA). The main research lines are ecophysiology of seaweeds related to climate and global change factors (UV radiation, temperature, acidification, nutrients), photobiology, photosynthesis, biotechnology of macro and microalgae, UV photoprotectors , antioxidants, lipids, immunological and anti-tumoral substances from algae and Cosmeceutics. He has published until May 2019: 27 book chapters, 213 regular papers and reviews and 15 patents on Mycosporine like amino acids as UV screen photoprotector . He has conducted 18 Doctoral Thesis and he has promoted international scientific cooperation specially with latinoamerican countries. He has H index: 37 (Scopus), 45 (Scholar Google) and according to Research gate, 42.77 and 6065 total citations.