CARLOS FREDERICO DUARTE ROCHA, is Professor of Ecology at the Departamentof Ecology, Institute of Biology at the Rio de Janeiro State University (UERJ) where he works since 1988. He received his Master (1987) and Ph.D. (1992) degree in Ecology both from the UniversidadeEstadual de Campinas (UNICAMP) in Campinas, São Paulo State, Brazil. His main interests are in Ecology and Conservation of amphibians and reptiles and has + 360 published articles. He has already supervised 31 students in Ph.D. degree and 39 in master´s degree . He is Adjunct Coordinator of the Graduate Program in Ecology and Evolution at UERJ and since 1993 he is the Leader of the Tropical Vertebrate Ecology Group of the Brazilian Council of Science and Tecnology (CNPq) of the Brazilian Environmental Ministry Coordinating 101 researchers (44 PhD researchers and 57 Graduate and undergraduate students).Since 2004 he is Level I-A CNPq Researcher (Higher level of Brazilian scientists attributed by the Brazilian Council of Science and Tecnology (CNPq) of the Brazilian Environmental Ministry.

Forest, Ecology, Biodiversity & Conservation

Pablo Refoyo Román, is Associated Professor of the Zoology and Physical Anthropology Department of the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM). He received his Master (2010) and Ph.D (2012) degree in Biology from UCM. He has supervised 1 student in Ph.D. degree and 16 in master´s degree. In his 25 years of professional life, he has experiences working with different Spanish administration in more than 55 projects about Iberian endangered species such as Otis tarda, Aquila adalberti, Aegypius monachus, Falco naumanni or cinegetic species as Cervus elaphus, Capra pyrenaica, Capreolus capreolus, Alectoris rufa, Oryctolagus cunniculus. He has 45 published articles and 10 books and book chapters and he has also participated in 42 national and international congresses (some of them as part of the organizing committee). He has wide experience in GIS and SDM and he is also the designer of “Biodiv”, a specific software to the vertebrates valoration in Environmenal Impact Studies (http://escalera.bio.ucm.es/recursos/biodiv/). His current research areas are focused on the relationship between parasitism and iberian mammals, especially ungulates and carnivores; and species distribution models of the Iberian peninsula’s fauna.

Biodiversity Conservation; Biodiversity and Sustainable Development; Biodiversity Models and Conservation Methods; Parasitology of Wild Fauna

Daan Vreugdenhil is currently the Director of the World Institute for Conservation and Environment, WICE. He has worked for the Dutch Government, the United Nations, the World Bank and the Interamerican Development Bank in the fields of biodiversity conservation, water management, environmental impact assessment, national parks planning, biodiversity monitoring and GIS-ecosystems mapping. His career of 4 decades took him to 80+ countries on 5 continents. He has developed a methodology through which ecosystems can be concisely defined and mapped. He is also a Member of the IUCN World Protected Areas Commission.

Biodiversity Conservation and Environmental Science

Sudhanshu Sekhar Panda is an Associate Professor of GIS/Environmental Science in the Institute of Environmental Spatial Analysis of University of North Georgia, USA. He has hisB.S. Degree in Agricultural Engineering from Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology, Orissa, India; M.S. degree is in Environmental Remote Sensing for Geoinformation Development from Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok, Thailand; and PhD in Agricultural Engineering from North Dakota State University, ND, USA. In his 27 years of professional life, he has experiences working in federal government, company, and academia. He is an avid researcher along with his present professional responsibility of a fulltime teaching faculty. His research area is very expansive due to his expertise in two interdisciplinary area, i.e., geospatial technology (GIS, remote sensing, GPS, information technology) and environmental management (water resources, soils, bioenvironmental engineering, precision agriculture, natural resources management, biodiversity preservation, global warming and climate change). Most of his research includes automated model development for environmental management decision support. He is Editor-in-Chief of O/S Journal of Spatial Hydrology and Editor of Journal of Biodiversity & Endangered Species and Journal of Ecosystem & Ecography. Dr. Panda is very well published. He has published more than 32 book chapters in Encyclopedia of Global Warming and Climate Change, Encyclopedia of Geographical Information Science, and Encyclopedia of American Environmental History, 3 vol. Remote Sensing Handbook, and multiple volume Green Series Books along with peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings. Above all, Dr. Panda aspires and working towards to be one of the best teachers who makes life changing improvement in disadvantaged students.

Biodiversity, Environmental Science

Feibo Wu has completed her PhD in 2003 from Zhejiang University (ZJU). She is the Deputy Director of Crop Science Institute of ZJU. Her main research interest is evaluation and identification of plant germplasm, mainly in barley, resistant/tolerant to abiotic stresses and its molecular physiology, and phytoremediation of metal-contaminated environments and safe crop production. She has published 97 papers in reputed SCI-JOURNALS and has been serving as an editorial board member of Plant Growth Regulation

Plant Biodiversity