Committee Members

CHAN is now the CEO and Principal Scientist of Gallant Biotechnology Limited who was Research Associate of Division of Life Science and Center for Chinese Medicine at HKUST and Research Assistant Professor of HKUST Shenzhen Research Institute. He has strong enthusiasm in developing quality assurance standards in valuable Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and nutraceuticals. He has been trained as a molecular biologist during his study of undergraduate and Master of Philosophy. After that, he has applied molecular authentication on TCM materials for more than 15 years. During the years he studied in HKUST, Dr. CHAN has equipped himself with frontier technology of quality control including the application of LC-MS/MS, macroscopic and microscopic identification of TCM and different cellular and pharmaceutical assays. His expertise is using multi-disciplinal quality assurance methods on a single specific subject. This style has been fully revealed on his PhD thesis about the quality assurance study on cubilose/edible bird‘s nest (EBN). After he has obtained his PhD in 2013, Dr. Chan switch his focus on cosmetics science and development of nutraceuticals products. In need of seeking new targets for product development, Dr. Chan also keen on developing high-throughput screening technology for drug screening. From 2013 to 2021, he has been involved in managing more than 10 government funded projects. He has published 38 papers on international scientific journals and 28 patents. He was the chief editor of a special issue of the scientific journal eCAM.

David William James, ND, is a naturopathic physician and researcher specializing in integrative oncology and chronic pain management. He has completed extensive clinical training in naturopathic oncology, regenerative medicine, and supportive cancer care. He has presented research on cellular therapy in oncology at OncANP and will be speaking at the 2025 Connecticut Naturopathic Physicians Association Conference on Breast Cancer. His focus is on bridging conventional and integrative approaches to optimize patient resilience and quality of life. Dr. James is an incoming PGY! resident at Naturoapthic Specialists LLC training under 2024 AANP Physician of the Year and founding President of the OncANP, Dr. Dan Rubin ND FABNO.

Chenzhong LI is the X.Q. Deng Presidential Chair Professor of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen) (CUHKSZ), the co-editor-in-chiefs of the international flagship journal Biosensor and Bioelectronics. Before joining CUHK Shenzhen in 2023, Li helds positions such as the research officer at the National Research Council Canada (NRC), the World Ahead professor at Florida International University, the professor of Biomedical Engineering at Tulane University, and the Program Director in the Chemical, Bioengineering, Environmental and Transport Systems (CBET) Division of National Science Foundation to oversee AI biosensors and biomedical devices research and manage grants for hundreds of research projects nationwide. Li is an expert in bioinstrumentation, specifically in the development of biomedical devices for both diagnostic and therapeutic, which could also have cross-applications for environmental, food safety monitoring, agriculture, and homeland security. Li is the Member of the Canadian Academy of Engineering, Member of the National Academy of Inventors, AIMBE fellow of the American Academy of Medical Biological Sciences. By 2025, he has published nearly 210 research papers, and is the main inventor of 21 international patents. He was the founder and technical director of three start-up companies in China, the United States, and Canada.

Jiaxu Chen is Chair Professor of the School of Chinese Medicine; Director of TCM Formula-pattern Research Center of Jinan University (JNU), Guangzhou, China. Chair Professor of Chinese Medicine Diagnostics in Beijing University of Chinese Medicine (BUCM). He has received the Changjiang (Yangtze River) Scholar award, the Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China, and the Distinguished Young Scholar in the National Science Foundation of China (NSFC). Prof. Jiaxu Chen focuses on the standardization of TCM syndromes and their biological basis of emotional disorders. His current research topics are the neurobiological pathology of depression and the antidepressant mechanism of Chinese medicine, Xiaoyaosan.

Zhaotong Cong is a researcher and Deputy Director of the Institute of Materia Medica Genomics, Chengdu University of Traditional Chinese Medicine. She received Ph.D. in 2021 from the School of Pharmacy, Fudan University. Her primary research focuses on the molecular pharmacology of traditional Chinese medicine, with an emphasis on GPCR-targeted drug discovery. As one of the principal investigators, she established the GPCR target library and high-throughput screening technology system for traditional Chinese medicine. She has published more than ten academic papers as the first author or corresponding author in internationally renowned journals, including PNAS (2021, 2022, 2023), Nature Communications (2020, 2021, 2022), Cell Discovery (2024a, 2024b), and The Innovation (2025).

Victor Benno MEYER-ROCHOW is a New Zealander with a PhD in Neurobiology and a DSc in Ethnobiomedical Studies (both from the Australian National University in Canberra). His physiological research took him several times to Antarctica and the Arctic, but whose ethnobiomedicall work focused on Central and Western Australia, Papua New Guinea, North-East India and the DPRK (North Korea). For 14 years (2000-2014) he worked at the International University in Bremen before becoming the Managing Director of the Research Institute of Luminous Organisms on the Japanese Pacific island of Hachijojima for 5 years. He then worked as Senior Scientist and Visiting Professor on a 3-year contract at Andong National University in Korea util June 2022 and is now back at Oulu University, Oulu SF-90140, Finland as an Emeritus Professor.

Nurdiana is currently the Head of the TuAH Industrial Research Laboratory and an Associate Professor at the School of Biology, Faculty of Applied Sciences, Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM). She graduated with a Bachelor of Biochemistry (Hons.) from Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia in 2005. Dr Nurdiana obtained her MSc in Physiology from UiTM and completed her PhD in Animal Physiology at Universiti Putra Malaysia. Dr Nurdiana strengthened her leadership and proficiency in academic administration at the Faculty of Applied Sciences and the Office of Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Research and Innovation, UiTM. She has successfully coordinated the Master of Applied Biology programme from 2018 to 2019 and contributed to the Pharmaceutical and Life Sciences track from 2019 to 2020 and the Health and Wellness track from 2020 to 2022. Over 15 years of service, she has been a Resource Person for multiple undergraduate and postgraduate courses, demonstrating her commitment to education and curriculum development. Her active involvement as a committee member of UiTM CARE highlights her dedication to the university community. Her service excellence has been recognized with several awards, including the Excellence Service Award by UiTM and the Office of Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Research and Innovation. As a researcher, Dr Nurdiana specializes in physiology, biochemistry, and natural products, focusing on investigating the biochemical and pathophysiological changes associated with diabetes, obesity, dementia, ageing, and polycystic ovary syndrome. Her research also extends to developing biomaterial carriers for a better chance of delivering active substances to specific tissue as an adjunct treatment. Dr Nurdiana has published over 20 research articles in peer-reviewed journals, accumulating more than 262 citations and achieving an h-index of 9 in Scopus. She has been awarded numerous national grants as a principal investigator, amounting to RM 1,477,600.00, and her work has gained international recognition, with features in Asia Research News and Wikipedia. Her innovation has garnered multiple awards, including a Grand Award from Bank Islam, 1 diamond, 5 golds, 3 silver, 1st running up in healthy lifestyle track, and accolades for best poster and best booth from 2017 to 2023. Her expertise is well recognized as she is the Editorial Board Member of multiple scientific journals like Scientific Research Journal (SRJ), International Pharmacy Acta (IPA) from Iran, Clinical Research in Nephrology & Kidney Diseases from India, and Journal of Advanced Agricultural Technologies (JOAAT) from Thailand. Dr Nurdiana was invited as a Visiting Professor at the Kazakh National Medical University (KazNMU) in 2023. With a mission to impart knowledge for the betterment of the nation, Dr Nurdiana decided to actively collaborate with industry partners to expedite the commercialization of research outputs. She initiated the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding and Agreement between UiTM and Bio Fluid Sdn Bhd in 2020 and 2022. Dr Nurdiana is the first researcher at UiTM registered under the Researcher Industry Scientific Exchange (RISE) program by the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (MOSTI). Beyond her academic and research achievements, Dr Nurdiana is dedicated to community engagement. She serves as an innovation advisor to nurture young talent at Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Saujana Utama and as secretary for the Setia Impian 3 Resident Association.

Mohd Azmuddin Abdullah obtained an M. Eng in Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology (1994) from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST), United Kingdom, and a PhD in Bioprocess Engineering (1999) from Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM). He was a Visiting Scientist (1997) at the Plant Physiology Laboratory, Kinki University, Japan, and a Post-Doctoral Fellow (2000-2001) at the Biomaterials Science and Engineering Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA. He was an Academic in the Department of Biotechnology, UPM (1994-2004), Department of Chemical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS (2004-2014), and in the Institute of Marine Biotechnology, Universiti Malaysia Terengganu (2015-2021). He was appointed as the Director of R&D in SIBCo Medical and Pharmaceuticals Sdn. Bhd. since August 2021. He has authored/co-authored 200 articles, presented in 50 conferences and had 6 Malaysian patents granted, and 3 trademarks, on bioenergy, bioproducts and biopharmaceuticals. In 2015, he was awarded the Teaching Excellence Award for “Health, Safety and Environment as the basis for innovative T, R, D, C & E on Sustainability” by the Association for the Advancement of Biodiversity Science (AABS), India; and in 2017, the Scientist Medal by the International Association of Advanced Materials (IAAM), at the European Advanced Material Congress, Sweden. In August 2022, he was appointed as Fellow by the IAAM for the contribution on “Integrated Biorefinery for Sustainable Energy and Bioproducts”