Speakers Final Conference

Coordinator of EU-LIFE

Marta Agostinho's fields of action include science policy, strategic science management and communication, outreach and public dialogue with science. She is also expert evaluator in EU programmes. As Coordinator of EU-LIFE Marta oversees the implementation of the strategy of the alliance and leads the science policy area. She holds a PhD in Cell Biology (2007) and a post-graduation in Science Communication (2009). She has over 12 years’ experience in knowledge mediation in international settings, after 10 years’ experience of research in life sciences and 5 years as Invited lecturer in Genetic Engineering. She was Director of the Communication & Training Unit at Instituto de Medicina Molecular (IMM), Lisbon, Portugal (2008-2012), which provided a coordinated framework for Science Communication, Advanced Training and Science Funding. She also worked as PhD programme manager (2007, IMM) and Project Manager (2012-2014, NOVA Medical School (FCM/UNL), Lisbon, Portugal) responsible for the coordination of a European Joint Action in Mental Health policy with over 50 partner institutions mandated by the EU Member States Governments from 27 European Countries. She has extensive experience as trainer and teacher (graduate and post-graduate).

Public Engagement and Knowledge Exchange Officer, Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine in the Helmholtz Association - Manager of Open Science training, artist in residency and the AEON art exhibition in ORION

Luiza studied chemistry and East and Central European studies in Sweden and Germany. In 2002, she received her PhD in biochemistry from the Freie Universität Berlin and then spent several years doing research, including at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in the USA. In 2011, she made her hobby, science communication, her main profession, moving from biomedical research of communication channels in cells to the creation of new channels for dialogue between science and society. At the Max-Delbrück-Center for Molecular Medicine in Berlin, she popularizes science through various events, further education of high school teachers and projects for collaboration between art, society and science and Open Science.
 

Head of International and Scientific Affairs Office, Centre for Genomic Regulation - Coordinator ORION Open Science EU-project 

Michela Bertero is the Head of International and Scientific Affairs at the Centre for Genomic Regulation in Barcelona. Her department´s mission is to strengthen the international and interdisciplinary dimension of the institute and create new opportunities for the scientific community by fostering new strategic partnerships, coordinating international collaborative projects, contributing to shape scientific policy and fostering scientific talent through integrated training programmes. She played a fundamental role in the creation of the European Alliance in life sciences, EU-LIFE (www.eu-life.eu), that she represented in the European Open Science Policy Platform advising Commissioner Moedas. She is coordinating the H2020 project ORION on Open Science. Prior to joining the CRG, she worked as postdoctoral researcher in molecular and structural biology and she holds a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology.

Citizen Science facilitator, Centre for Genomic Regulation, CRG - Project Manager Genigma Citizen Science

Elisabetta works as a Citizen Science facilitator at the CRG. She has a PhD in Biology and more than 15 years of experience in science communication and engagement. Her role is to support the scientific teams in the process of opening science to citizen participation. She has been responsible for the organization of the events (co-creations, play-tests) and the contents for the website, social networks, and game's outreach elements.

Head of Open Research, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)

Rachel Bruce is an expert in open research policy and infrastructure, e.g. open access, open data / software, responsible research assessment and research information at the policy and technical levels. She is an Information Scientist and has led national and international initiatives in scholarly communication including digital infrastructure covering curation, dissemination and associated legal issues. She led the establishment of the UK network of digital repositories while in her position at Jisc, and was an advisor to the EC on the scope of the EOSC. She has helped to advise on scholarly communications innovations such as the US based Open Science Framework. Currently she is lead for the UK Research and Innovation open research portfolio.  She is Chair of the Plan S responsible research assessment Taskforce, and the UK representative on the G7 open science working group. Recently she has led the development of the new UKRI Open Access policy that was announced on 6 August 2021.

Director of Operations, Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology (FECYT) 

Cecilia Cabello is Director of Operations at FECYT (Spanish Foundation for S&T). She has a degree in Food Science (Michigan State University) and a Master's in Science, Technology and Society (University Autonomous Madrid). Since 2002 she has developed her professional career at FECYT managing and supervising departments in the areas of science outreach and communication, R&D indicators, scientific information management, open science, researchers’ career and mobility, science diplomacy and support to the internationalization of science. She is a member of the OECD-NESTI Bureau, chair of the European Research Area and Innovation Committee (ERAC) Standing Working Group (SWG) for Human Resources and Mobility and member of the ERAC SWG for Open Science and Innovation.

Science journalist - Moderator

Michele holds a PhD in Physics (complex networks theory) from the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC). He has worked for more than a decade as a freelance journalist, writing mainly on science, environment, health, technology, and science policy, but also covering current affairs related to justice and organized crime. He has worked for media in the UK, Spain, Italy, and Mexico, writing in English, Spanish, Italian, and Catalan. Among other media: the science magazine Nature, the newspaper El Periódico de Catalunya, and Le Scienze, the Italian version of Scientific American. He has worked as well as director and script writer for RTVE (the Spanish public television), BarcelonaTV and has been directing web documentaries for EU-funded research and communication projects. He is also the author of "Networks: A Very Short Introduction" (Oxford University Press, 2012).
 

Senior social researcher, K&I (Knowledge and Innovation)

Claudia has a long experience in the interdisciplinary study of contemporary social phenomena from a gender and RRI perspectives. Among her main research interests can be mentioned: the process of structural change towards gender equality in science (including intersectionality) and Responsible Research and Innovation; participatory approaches aimed at fostering a socialisation of R&I and its alignment with societal needs and challenges (eg. citizen social science initiatives, quadruple helix collaborations for sustainable and open innovation, building of territorial multi-stakeholder coalitions for responsible R&I ecosystems); the raising of scientific citizenship; the sociological analysis of the relations between security and privacy in the context of surveillance; the co-evolution of science and society in the post-modern society. She is also an expert in planning, implementation and evaluation of training and adult education activities and in technical assistance, monitoring and evaluation of structural change initiatives. Over the last 20 years she has been working and coordinating numerous projects both Italy and Europe, as well as in Africa, Latin America and Australia, funded by Italian public institutions and by European Union (FP6, FP7 and H2020). From 2016-2019, she has been involved as part of the technical assistance team, in the EU Project STARBIOS2 - Structural Transformation to Attain Responsible BIOSciences, aimed at experimenting effective strategies for fostering structural change to attain RRI in biosciences.

Project Officer, European Research Executive Agency (REA), European Commission

Mihaela Costache is a project officer in charge of grant management and monitoring actions related to Reforming and Enhancing the European Research and Innovation systems. Before joining REA, Mihaela has been a policy officer at DG Research & Innovation following closely mobility and researcher career policies. She has been the coordinator of EURAXESS - one of the largest networks supporting researchers’ mobility and career development, with support centers spread in 42 countries. Her main task was to facilitate the open labour market for researchers and improve the attractiveness of the research profession in an excellence-driven European Research Area. Mihaela was also responsible for the EURAXESS portal, which lists thousands of jobs, funding and hosting opportunities for the research domain. She has also coordinated the digitalization project of the Human Resources Strategy for Researchers (HRS4R) procedure. Prior to joining the European Commission, Mihaela worked in communication roles in multinational corporations. She studied at the University of Bucharest, specializing in English and French languages and literatures, as well as communication and HR. 

Digna Couso, Lecturer, Research Centre on Science and Mathematics Education (CRECIM) - Project evaluation 

Digna Couso has a Bachelor's Degree in Physics and a PhD in Science Education. Nowadays, she is a Lecturer at the Faculty of Education at UAB. She is the director of CRECIM (Research Centre on Science and Mathematics Education) since 2015. Her main lines of research are: communities of practice in STEM curriculum development, within the context and competence-based framework for STEM; Research based on the design of teaching and learning sequences and materials, particularly in participatory settings and using learning progressions as a design and validation tool; Teaching and learning focused on modelling in science and particularly in physics for the primary and secondary levels and Equity and gender balance in STEM, including analysis of interest, self-efficacy and aspirations in STEM. She has also expertise in evaluation of educational and social initiatives using social science methods, particularly related with RRI and Open Science. This has led her to author the National Guide to Evaluate Outreach activities for FECYT and her participation as Advisory Committee in RRI projects such as SeeRRI, EnRRIch and others. At ORION, she is leading the evaluation effort of the project.
 

Project Manager, South Moravian Centre for International Mobility (JCMM) - Regional funding calls

Michael graduated in 1996 from the School of Business and Administration, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic. Since his graduation, he has been involved in writing and administrating EU programmes and projects, first at Masaryk University (including teaching courses in marketing, public relations and Czech economic transition), followed by an employment at the Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority. He represented CAFIA in EU food safety working groups and coordinated development of new surveillance methods on the Czech food-market. Since 2012, he has been responsible for the COFUND programme SOMOPRO - South Moravian Programme for Distinguished Researchers which was designed to attract researchers to live in Brno and work at universities and research institutions situated in the region of South Moravia. Michael is the project manager for ORION at JCMM.

Project and Communications Manager, VA Public & Science - Moderator

Helen has worked as a Project and Communications Manager for VA Public & Science since 2013. She has worked on a number of European projects, including managing VA’s participation in the Horizon 2020 SciShops project. Prior to VA she worked at the British Council in Sweden, managing pan-European projects and developing new projects and partnerships. Helen has also worked in a number of communication roles for the Department for Education and Skills and the Institution of Electrical Engineers in the UK. Helen received a BA (Hons) in Contemporary European Studies from Southampton University. She also holds the Project Management Professional (PMP) credential. She is currently involved in a number of EU projects and other communications work.
 

Head of Unit for Open Science, DG Research & Innovation, European Commission

Kostas has been developing EU policy and managing R&D programmes in the area of Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) in Brussels since 1992. Policy areas he has dealt with include open science and innovation, collaboration in research, industry-academia interaction, the governance of research commons, public-private partnerships, science diplomacy and international cooperation policy at bilateral and bi-regional level. In the academic year 2017-2018 Kostas was a visiting Fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore where he taught regionalism in Europe and in Southeast Asia. Before joining the Commission Kostas worked in the chemical industry in the USA and Belgium, lectured at the University and carried out research in Greece. He holds a PhD in engineering from the University of Massachusetts and an Advanced Professional Certificate in investment management from Drexel University in the USA.

Educational Scientist, MDC - Open Science training & podcast

Zoe Ingram is an Educational Scientist specialized in Adult Education, working at the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine in der Helmholtz Association in the ORION project. She contributes her pedagogical knowledge in designing training to support researchers to get on board with the Open Science movement and be able to take action. She is co-host of the ORION Open Science podcast, covering an array of Open Science topics. She also supports various outreach and public engagement activities to make science more open to society and society more open to science.

Communications Lead at the Central European Institute of Technology (CEITEC) 

Ester Jarour is in charge of communications and public relations at CEITEC Masaryk University. She helps scientists to showcase their research results and to present the benefits of science for the society. She also serves as a spokesperson of CEITEC (MU) and handles all media inquiries, issues press releases, and represents the institute at official events. In her previous role at CEITEC (MU) she was responsible for career development of researchers at all career levels and for facilitating knowledge sharing activities. Before joining CEITEC she worked at the Delegation of the European Union to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, supporting development projects in the area of education and youth. She also worked as an academic consultant at Global Vision USA and was responsible for recruitment of international students for more than 75 US universities in the Middle East and GCC countries. She studied international management at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences in Switzerland and has more than 15 years of professional experience abroad.
 

Director of the Department of Science, “la Caixa” Foundation - ORION Advisory board

Ignasi is a physicist by training and holds 20 year experience in Research and Innovation funding and management and in Science in society issues. In representation of “la Caixa” Foundation he is the elected Chairman of the Research Forum of the European Foundation Centre and was chair of the Advisory Board of Ethical, Legal and Social Issues (ELSI) of the European Institute of Technology EIT-Health (2016-18). He is a member of the Board of Trustees of IsGlobal, the Barcelona Institute for Global Health. He was Member of the European Commission “Expert Group on Venture Philanthropy and Social Investments” among other participations at national and international R&I policy initiatives. In the field of Science in Society he has participated in several EU funded projects of Open Science and of Responsible Research and Innovation and was the coordinator of the EC funded (FP7) project RRI Tools. He is a graduate in Physics from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (with a year at the Université Joseph Fourier, Grenoble) and holds a Postgraduate Business Management degree at IESE-University of Navarra.

Rector Magnificus Emeritus, Delft University of Technology

Karel Luyben was Rector Magnificus of the Delft University of Technology from 2010 until 2018.In 1983 he was appointed full professor in Biochemical Engineering at the Delft University of Technology, and from there has gained experience in research, starting a SME, research leadership, leading European organisations like the European Federation of Biotechnology and CESAER. He presently works on Open Science, as National Coordinator for Open Science in the Netherlands; Chairman of the Task Force Open Science of CESAER and after being chairman of the Executive Board of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC)(2019-2020), he is now the President of the EOSC Association.

Public Engagement Officer, Babraham Institute - Project officer open experiments and co-creation including public dialogues

Emma has been leading policy and advocacy activities to promote a sustainable research environment since 2014. During the last four years, at the ORION Open Science project, her focus has been on embedding open research practices in research funding and performing organisations in Europe. A highlight of this work has been an action plan to embed open science at the Babraham Institute (Cambridge, UK). Previously, Emma worked at a membership organisation providing a unified voice for biomedical research in Europe. During the review of the European Directive on the protection of animals used in scientific processes (EU/2010/63) in 2016, Emma coordinated a pan-EU response to successfully uphold the Directive. Emma holds a PhD in Cellular Biology from Utrecht University Medical Centre in the Netherlands (2012), MSc Biochemistry and BSc Biology from Complutense University in Madrid (Spain).
 

Senior research scientist, Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine in the Helmholtz Association - Project Manager - SMOVE - Science that makes me move

Katharina is a nutritional epidemiologist (senior research scientist) at MDC (Molecular Epidemiology Research Group). Her research is focused on studying lifestyle factors, including obesity, physical activity and diet, and chronic disease risk in human populations and elucidating the underlying mechanisms. Katharina’s  special research focus is on studying the role of early life exposure (e.g. diet and physical activity during adolescence) in relation to later risk of colorectal neoplasia. She studied nutrition and epidemiology, and did her PhD at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg and my postdoc at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health before joining MDC in 2011.

Schools Public Engagement Office, Babraham Institute - Project Manager Virus Fighter

Fergus coordinates the Babraham Institute's school engagement programme.  He was the project lead on VACCINE, an ORION project to co-develop a game about viruses and vaccinations with local school students.  His professional interests include exploring creative engagement methods and working with underserved communities.

Senior researcher, Instituto Salud Carlos III, ISCIII - Coordinator MELTIC - Ideas MELting pot for ITC and Health Science for Citizens in Small Communities

Victoria has a background as a Radio communications R+D engineer in the private industry. Since 1996, she has been a research scientist and now she is a PhD researcher, as civil servant, at the Instituto de Salud Carlos III, belonging to the Ministry of Science and Innovation, in the Research Area of Telemedicine and Digital Health, in Madrid, Spain. Her research focuses on the area of wireless communications applications for home care and the disruptive technologies related to next generations of Sensors Networks and Body Area Networks and telemedicine applications. The objectives are to provide health care for mobile citizens focusing on new emergent health services based on telemedicine. Dr. Ramos takes part of several European and Spanish Standardizations Committees, IEEE senior member and deep  involvement in the evaluation of the proposals for European and Spanish calls for funding.

Head of Public engagement, Babraham Institute

Peter is a Senior Group Leader within the Epigenetics Programme at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, UK. He is also the Head of Public Engagement at the Babraham Institute and has enjoyed participating as a scientist in the ORION project. Peter trained in the UK and in Canada, and was then awarded a Wellcome Trust Career Development Fellowship in 2011, which he undertook at the Babraham Institute. He was awarded tenure in 2017. Peter’s research interests centre on understanding how gene activity is controlled during human development and how this affects cell fate decisions in stem cells and in embryos.
 

Technical officer, Instituto de Salud Carlos III - Coordinator of the ORION RRI Health Awards

Iris has a degree in communication (Complutense University, Madrid), Master's degree in gender and communication. For the last 10 years she has worked in the health sector, in different positions, always related to communication and the organization of events, masters and training. For the last two years, she has worked at the Carlos III Health Institute as Project Manager of the ORION project, carrying out tasks related to Open Access and Open Science.

Public Engagement Coordinator, Centre for Genomic Regulation - Coordinator CRG Public Dialogue

Marta coordinates the CRG’s public engagement programme since 2014 and has more than nine years’ experience of devising strategies and activities that develop a two-way conversation between scientists and stakeholders. She’s passionate about boosting not just scientific literacy, but a real two-way, reciprocal engagement between researchers and the general public. Marta emphasise the use of innovative approaches like participatory methods to conduct real dialogues with tangible outcomes. Marta graduated in Chemistry from University of Barcelona and has a Master's degree in Scientific, Medical & Environmental Communication from IDEC - Pompeu Fabra University.