Steen Buntzen is a Colorectal Surgeon and Senior Lecturer at, Aarhus University Hospital, Aarhus Amtssygehus. Steen is Head of the Department of Anal Physiology. He graduated with an MD from University of Copenhagen in 1982 and became a Specialist in surgical Gastroenterology in 1995. He carried out his training as a Colorectal Surgeon in Gothenburg, Sweden from 1990 – 1996, completing his thesis on ‘Pharmacological and Physiological Studies on the Control of Recto-anal Motility’ in 1995. He took up a consultant post at Aarhus University Hospital in 1997. His special interests include IBD (pouch surgery), salvage surgery for anal cancer, and functional diseases. He has a major interest and active research programme in the area of functional diseases and faecal incontinence. Clinically and scientifically sacral nerve stimulation has an increasingly prominent role in the management of faecal incontinence and also in patients with constipation and IBS. His work has involved developing the concept and organizational structures where specialist nurses now screen and conduct all conservative treatment in functional diseases. Steen Bunzten and his Department are international leaders in research and clinical practice in the field of sacral nerve stimulation.

Peter Gibson is Professor of Medicine at Monash University and Head of the Eastern Health Clinical School. He is the Executive Clinical Director of Specialty Medicine and Director of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Eastern Health. He is a Past-President of the Gastroenterological Society of Australia and was the inaugural Chair of IBD-Australia.

From a background of research in epithelial cell biology, he now runs a large program of translational research and has active clinical interests in inflammatory bowel disease, coeliac disease and irritable bowel syndrome.

A major focus of his work is the use of diet to control gut symptoms and influence outcomes in chronic intestinal conditions. He has published more than 200 peer-reviewed papers and was awarded the Distinguished Research Prize by the Gastroenterological Society of Asutralia in 2010.

Jacob George is the Robert W. Storr Professor of Gastroenterology and Hepatic Medicine, Storr Liver Unit, Westmead Millennium Institute, University of Sydney; Head, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Westmead Hospital and Director of Gastroenterology and Hepatology Services, Western Sydney Local Health Network. He undertakes basic and clinical research on non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, liver cancer, hepatic fibrosis and on the molecular basis for disease progression in chronic hepatitis C. Twenty of his publications since 2002 have been the subject of Editorials, Editorial Highlights or Editorial comment. Professor George is on the Editorial Board of Hepatology, Liver international, Hepatology International and World Journal of Gastroenterology. He is a member of the Executive Council of the Asian Pacific Association for the Study of the Liver. He has been Chief Investigator since 1998 in over 50 clinical trials.

Professor Montgomery graduated with his PhD from Massey University in 1977 and spent the first 20 years of his career working in animal reproduction and genetics in New Zealand. He moved to Australia in 1999 and is currently an NHMRC Principal Research Fellow and Head of the Molecular Epidemiology Laboratory at the Queensland Institute of Medical Research. The goal of Professor Montgomery’s research is to determine critical genes and pathways increasing risk for common diseases including endometriosis, melanoma and inflammatory bowel disease. He also directs a high throughput genomics laboratory identifying genes contributing to a range of other complex diseases.

Midgette Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology
Director, Multidisciplinary IBD Center,
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

Dr. Sartor completed his internship and residency in Internal Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine and Gastroenterology fellowship at the University of North Carolina. He has been a faculty member at UNC for his entire academic career, where he is now the Midgette Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology and serves as Director of the UNC Multidisciplinary IBD Center, Co-Chief of the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology (Research) and Co-Director of the NIDDK-funded Center for Gastrointestinal Biology and Disease.

Dr. Sartor’s research interests are understanding the pathogenesis of Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis and translating this basic science knowledge to improve the diagnosis and treatment of IBD.  He directs the UNC Multidisciplinary Center for IBD, which was recently designated by the CCFA as an IBD Center of Excellence, and participates in the IBD clinic and multiple clinical trials of novel treatments of IBD. Dr. Sartor has been included as one of the Best Doctors in America for the past 11 years and was recently recognized by the CCFA for his accomplishments in basic IBD research. He has published approximately 175 peer-reviewed research articles, 150 reviews, editorials and chapters and has edited 5 books, including Kirsner’s Inflammatory Bowel Diseases, 6th edition.

Dr. Sartor has served on many different NIH and CCFA Study Sections and is active in the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA).  He has served as Chairman of the NIH NIDDK-C Study Section, Chairman of multiple CCFA committees, including the Research Training Awards Committee, Research Grants Committee and the National Scientific Advisory Committee, and is the immediate past chair of the AGA Immunology, Microbiology and Inflammatory Bowel Diseases Section.  He is principal investigator of the NIDDK-funded UNC Basic Science T32 Training Grant, has been the mentor of over 60 research fellows and students, many whom have attained faculty positions, and the informal mentor of innumerable students and fellows in other departments and institutions around the world.  He is the immediate past Chair of the Immunology, Microbiology and Inflammatory Bowel Diseases Section of the AGA.

Jürgen Schölmerich is Professor of Medicine and Gastroenterology and currently the Medical Director and CEO of the Hospital Board of the University Hospital Frankfurt, Germany. Prof. Schölmerich initially followed dual interest with studies in mathematics and medicine before graduating in medicine in 1973 from the University of Freiburg. He was promoted to MD with the thesis “On gluconeogenesis and urea synthesis of the liver in uremia, studies on the isolated perfused liver” and later granted Lecturer in Medicine (Habilitation) on the topic “Bioluminiscence assays for bile acids and steroids”. Following several years of experimental research at the Departments of Chemistry and Pathology at the University of San Diego, USA he was appointed Professor or Medicine at the University of Freiburg in 1987 and then in 1991 Director of the Department for Internal Medicine I of the University of Regensburg, Germany.

Prof. Schölmerich is on the Editorial Boards of several general medical and gastrointestinal journals including Nature Reviews Gastroenterology and Hepatology and GUT and is the Vice-President of the German Research Society (DFG). He is also advisor to several national and international organisations and government institutions. Professor Schölmerich published more than 1000 original papers, reviews and chapters on several aspects of gastroenterology. With a research background on liver and gastrointestinal disorders he is now actively involved in aspects of health management and economics.