Tomasz Ruman, Ph.D.
Politechnika Rzeszowska Wydział Chemiczny: Rzeszow, PL

Prof. Dr. Hab. Eng. Tomasz Ruman (born 1980) is a full professor and a research and teaching employee at the Department of Inorganic and Analytical Chemistry at the Faculty of Chemistry of the Rzeszów University of Technology. He specializes, among others, in matrix-free methods for laser mass spectrometry, synthesis and characterization of nanostructures, and mass spectrometry imaging methods. He applies and optimizes new methods for the study of biological material – microbiological systems, physiological fluids, human, animal and plant tissues. This research has been expanded to include the application of new methods for new, small-molecule cancer biomarkers of kidney, prostate and bladder cancer. He has promoted six PhDs, five of whom worked in the area of ​​new methods for laser mass spectrometry and mass spectrometry imaging. He is the designer and creator of the first experimental setup for direct 3D MSI. He published his research results in prestigious journals, for example Journal of Pharmaceutical Analysis, Analytical Chemistry, Scientific Reports, Analytica Chimica Acta, the Analyst, Metabolomics, Journal of Cultural Heritage, International Biodeterioration and Biodegradation. He is also the editor-in-chief of the local scientific journal Chemical Technology & Biotechnology. He is the author or co-author of 110 scientific publications (98 in the SCOPUS database) and his H-index is 22. 

Eva Cuypers, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, Imaging Mass Spectrometry M4I – Imaging Mass Spectrometry (IMS)

Dr. Eva Cuypers is an Associate Professor and Group Leader at the Maastricht MultiModal Molecular Imaging Institute (M4i), Maastricht University. She leads the research group Mass Spectrometry Imaging in Peri-Operative Diagnostics, where she focuses on developing and applying cutting-edge multi-omics technologies for translational medicine.

She obtained her PhD in Biomedical Sciences at the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences – Toxicology, KU Leuven (Belgium), where she also pursued postdoctoral research in Forensic Toxicology. She continued her postdoctoral training at AMOLF (Amsterdam, The Netherlands), specializing in Mass Spectrometry Imaging (MSI). Her innovative research on drug distribution in hair using MSI earned her four international awards and established her reputation as a leader in the field. From 2014 to 2019, Dr. Cuypers was Assistant Professor in Forensic Toxicology at KU Leuven, where she focused on analytical science, method development, and the application of high-resolution mass spectrometry to complex biological matrices. In 2019, she joined M4i, a leading international institute for molecular imaging, where she has expanded her research focus to encompass multi-omics strategies aimed at clinical diagnostics and personalized medicine.

Dr. Cuypers’ research integrates mass spectrometry imaging with multi-omics approaches—including proteomics, metabolomics, and lipidomics—to achieve spatially resolved molecular characterization of tissues in both research and clinical contexts. Her work is at the forefront of translating complex molecular data into clinically actionable insights.

Her group has developed novel spatial omics workflows that combine MSI with complementary omics data layers, enabling the detailed mapping of cell types, disease-associated pathways, and microenvironmental interactions within tissues. These technologies are applied to build spatial multi-omics atlases that offer insight into tissue heterogeneity, particularly in oncology.

Her work is strongly translational, aimed at converting molecular insights into practical, clinician-ready solutions that advance the frontiers of precision diagnostics and surgical decision-making.

Ian Gilmore, Ph.D.
Professor, Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences and Senior Fellow at the National Physical Laboratory

Prof. Ian Gilmore is a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences and Senior Fellow at the National Physical Laboratory. He is also a Visiting Professor in the School of Pharmacy at the University of Nottingham and founding director of the UK’s National Centre of Excellence in Mass Spectrometry (NiCE-MSI). He has made breakthroughs in high-resolution molecular imaging by mass spectrometry. His innovation of OrbiSIMS technology has had a wide impact across research in biomedicine and novel devices, revolutionising the ability to measure chemistry at surfaces and interfaces. Now commercialised, OrbiSIMS are being used around the world, giving ground-breaking insights into how neighbouring cells regulate each other’s metabolism, to map metabolic heterogeneity in cancer tumours and next generation biomaterials discovery. His research interests also include 3D molecular imaging of complex interfaces in organic electronics, batteries and additive manufactured devices.

Ian is the recipient of the Medard W. Welch Award (2025), Alfred Benninghoven Award (2024), ECASIA Award (2024), IUVSTA Prize and gold medal for Technology (2022), the UKSAF Riviere prize (2013) and the IoP Paterson medal (2004). He leads international standardisation in surface chemical analysis and is chair of VAMAS TWA 2 and past chair of ISO TC 201 SC 6 (Mass Spectrometry). He is championing the topic of research integrity and reproducibility and is a member of the UK Committee on Research Integrity.

Andreia M. Porcari, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, São Francisco University

Ramon C. Sun, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, College of Medicine, University of Florida

Dr. Ramon Sun is the Anne and Oscar Lackner Endowed Chair and Associate Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Florida. He serves as Director of the Center for Advanced Spatial Biomolecule Research. His laboratory develops next-generation spatial metabolomics technologies to investigate how metabolic pathways are organized in space and time. Dr. Sun’s research focuses on the role of metabolism in aging, neurodegeneration, fibrosis, and cancer, including pediatric sarcoma and neurological glycogen storage diseases. His work integrates biochemistry, mass spectrometry imaging, and systems biology to uncover fundamental metabolic principles and drive therapeutic discovery.

Yuki Sugiura, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, School of Medicine, Keio University

Jennifer Pett-Ridge, Ph.D.
Distinguished Member of Technical Staff at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory

Jennifer is a Distinguished Member of Technical Staff and lead of the ‘Carbon Initiative’ at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, an adjunct professor at UC Merced, and an investigator at the University of California-Berkeley Innovative Genomics Institute. Trained in soil ecology and bio-geo-chemistry, she studies how plants and soil microorganisms interact, using stable isotopes as tracers, DNA and RNA analyses, and mathematical modeling. Her current research is largely focused on how to make soil carbon persist through sustainable agricultural innovation. Recently, she led a large team project for the US Department of Energy–called “Roads to Removal”, it is a national analysis of the capacity and costs for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, with data for every county in the USA. She is currently the lead of a new DOE Energy Earthshot Research Center called Terraforming Soil—her team is designing novel bio- and geo-engineering approaches to get carbon ‘out of the air and back into the ground’. She has been recognized with the US Department of Energy Early Career award and Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award, and is a fellow of the Ecological Society of America and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Jazz Dickinson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, University of California San Diego

Jazz Dickinson received her PhD in analytical chemistry from University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill and then conducted her post-doctoral research in developmental plant biology at Duke University. She also was a visiting scientist at Stanford University and the Carnegie of Science for two years to study plant stress response. Jazz started her faculty position at UCSD in 2020, where her lab investigates the metabolites that pattern plant development. Since starting her lab, she has been a recipient of the Moore Inventor Fellowship, the Hellman Fellowship, and the Arthur C. Neish Young Investigator Award.

Alison Scott, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Department of Microbial Pathogenesis, University of Maryland, Baltimore

Dr. Alison Scott is an assistant professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, in the Department of Microbial Pathogenesis. Alison is the co-director of the Spatial Systems Biology Laboratory (SSBL). Her laboratory uses MSI to identify new host-directed therapy targets in pulmonary infections including bacterial, viral, and fungal models. Using this approach, she has defined new mechanisms of bacterial pathogenesis through host lipid and metabolite regulation using image-driven methods. These investigations now extend into models of neuroinflammation, sterile inflammation, and chronic pain.

Mitsutoshi Setou, Ph.D.
Professor,  Hamamatsu University School of Medicine