Dr Zyta Ziora received PhD (Wroclaw University of Science & Technology, Poland) in chemistry and has wide range of experience in development of antimalarial therapeutics (the University of Montpellier, France), antibacterial agents, enzyme inhibitors and drug candidates against Alzheimer disease (Kyoto Pharmaceutical University, Japan). Her research time is currently dedicated mainly to projects devoted to the modification of existing antibiotics, and complexing them with additional antimicrobial agents, like metal ions, to produce more potent alternatives and by this to overcome the drug resistance of superbugs. She is also working on alternative to antibiotics nature-derived compounds with antimicrobial and anticancer potency, such poliphenolic derivatives to control tyrosinase function.

Doctor Anthony Verderosa is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Institute for Molecular Bioscience (IMB) at the University of Queensland (UQ). Verderosa is the head researcher of a team dedicated to the design, synthesis, and microbiological evaluation of antibiotic conjugates. Their project involves synthetically linking different antibiotics and/or antibiotic adjuvants to generate novel dual-acting antimicrobial conjugates to treat resistant bacterial infections. Verderosa is an early career researcher (ECR) with expertise in synthetic organic chemistry, molecular bacteriology, antimicrobial testing, drug development, and biofilm remediation. His PhD (2020) involved transdisciplinary work (chemistry/microbiology) that focused on discovering and developing nitroxide-functionalised antibiotics - new drugs for treating and eradicating microbial biofilms. After submitting his PhD, Verderosa accepted a Postdoctoral Research position in molecular bacteriology and bacterial pathogenesis, where he developed new methods and strategies for tackling antimicrobial resistance.