EPITARGET Scientific Advisory Board

The Scientific Advisory Board will ensure a high standard of research and monitor the progress of the project by taking part in the annual General Assembly meetings. Whenever appropriate, it will consult the consortium and make recommendations as to improve their performance.

Members

The Scientific Advisory Board will consist of 8 experts representing the key aspects of activities of the project, as indicated by the work packages. As such, the SAB members represent leaders in the field of epileptology, brain trauma (TBI), drug development, patient organizations and neuro-ethical issues. The members have been nominated before the initiation of the project and have agreed to take on the responsibility.

The EPITARGET Consortium grieves for SAB member Hanneke de Boer. We are grateful for all her valuable advise and the positivity she brought to the meetings. It is a great loss for EPITARGET and she will be deeply missed. An obituary describing her life’s work and achievements as one of the most important advocates for people with epilepsy has been published by the International Bureau for Epilepsy.

Jerome Engel, Jr., is a Jonathan Sinay Distinguished Professor of Neurology, Neurobiology and Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at UCLA, USA, and one of the world’s leading opinion builders in the field of epileptology.
Jacqueline French, a coordinator of Human Epilepsy Project (HEP) US, at Comprehensive Epilepsy Center, NY, USA: The HEP is exploring biomarkers of late stage epileptogenesis in patients and this interaction will be extremely valuable to facilitate translational aspects of EPITARGET.
Andras Büki, from Pecs University, coordinator of EC FP7 funded TBI Consortium WP on TBI biomarkers: This consortium explores biomarkers for TBI in human subjects, and therefore networking and collaboration with this consortium will be of great value for EPITARGET where TBI is one of the models of epileptogenesis.
Rafal Kaminski, Senior Director, Head Epilepsy, UCB Biopharma SPRL. Dr. Kaminski is an expert in discovery of antiepileptic drugs and will help EPITARGET with advise on drug discovery and development strategies.
Alberto Martinez-Serrano is a Professor at Dept. of Molecular Biology (Univ. Autónoma de Madrid) and Dept. of Molecular Neurobiology (Center of Molecular Biology Severo Ochoa, Univ. Autónoma Madrid - C.S.I.C.), Spain, and one of the prominent Parkinson’s disease and stem cell researchers, who has been active in advice to various granting bodies, including EC, ERCEA and IMI-JU, for questions related to ethical issues.
Ann J Little (Ireland) has been serving as Executive Director of the International Bureau for Epilepsy (IBE), the international network organisation of national patients associations, since 1997. She is also the current President of the European Federation of Neurological Associations (EFNA).
Roland Krause is a bioinformatician at the Luxembourg Center for Systems Biomedicine of the University of Luxembourg, involved as work package leader in the EC-funded projects BioCOG and EPiPGX. He is a member of the strategy committee of the international epilepsy genetics project Epi25.
Hanneke M. de Boer is a well-known expert and specialist in patient-related aspects of epileptology, such as the social aspects and stigma. She is a past-president of IBE (global patient organization) and was the chair and co-ordinator of the ILAE/IBE/WHO Global Campaign Against Epilepsy.