Featuring the special issue editor: Professor Alexandros G. Georgakilas

Abstract

Alexandros Georgakilas was born in Athens, Greece. He graduatedwith Honors fromhigh-school in 1998 and from the University of Athens, Greece, in 1992with a BSc in Physics. His love for Applied Physics led him to a PhD program in the same university and finally a PhD degree in Radiation Biology from the Department of Biology, University of Athens, Greece, at 1998. After his military service in theGreek army, he pursued post-doctoral research studies in Greece and USA working in the well known laboratory of Dr. Betsy Sutherland at Brookhaven National Laboratories (NY, USA) on the field of complex DNA lesions, their detection and biological importance. Dr. Alexandros Georgakilas is currently an Assistant Professor of Radiation Biophysics in the Physics Department, School of Applied Mathematical and Physical Sciences, National Technical University of Athens (Greece) and Adjunct Associate Professor of Biology (with tenure) in theDepartmentof Biologyat East CarolinaUniversity (ECU), Greenville, NC, USA. His devotion in Radiation Biology and biological effects of ionizing radiation started earlywith his Bachelor thesis (1991–1992) on the ‘Effects of Ionizing Radiation on DNA’s Thermal Stability’. Overall, Dr. Georgakilas has been an active non-stop researcher in the field of Radiation Biology for more than 20 years. He has been supported by various Fellowship awards, including the ESRB 1996 Fellowship, European Radiation Research Society Fellowship, NATO Fellowship, Gordon Fellowship, and Post-Doctorate Fellowship of the Greek Secretariat of Technology. He has also received awards such as the Young Investigator Travel Award from Radiation Research Society, Radiation Research Society SIT Award, ECU Thomas Harriot College Research Award, and the prestigious Terashima Award from Japan Radiation Research Society. Dr. Georgakilas has participated and presented to many international meetings, numerous national meetings of Greek and US Scientific Societies, many publications in peer reviewed scientific journals, and several publications in books and conference proceedings from international meetings. His work as Principal Investigator (PI) has been funded in Europe and USA by various sources like European Union (Marie Curie Re-Integration Grant, COST Actions, Hellenic National grants THALES), East Carolina University, NC Biotechnology Center and Union for International Cancer Control (UICC), which is the largest cancer fighting organization of its kind, with more than 400 member organizations across 120 countries. His quality research work has been published in more than fifty (70) peer-reviewed high profile journals like Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences USA, Journal of Cell Biology, Cancer Research, Radiation Research, Cancer Letters, Free Radical Biology and Medicine, Pharmacology and Therapeutics and in more than fifteen hundred (2500) citations (hindex = 26). During his years at ECU and NTUA he has trained several graduate and undergraduate students and participated in more than ten (20) graduate committees and NASA/DOD review panels. In recognition of his major contributions in the field he has recently been appointed as the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Biochemical Technology, Associate Editor of Radiation Research and Cancer Letters, and Editorial Board member for Molecular Biosystems and several other well-recognized journals. Last but not least, Dr. Georgakilas has been invited as a Guest Editor for Special Issues of Mutation Research, Cancer Letters and Current Molecular Medicine, and he has been the supervising editor for several book projects in the field of radiation biology and cancer research. Please visit his Google scholar official web page for more details and updates on his publications: http://scholar.google.gr/citations?user=MAD6KTcAAAAJ&hl =el or his official web page at NTUA: http://dielectricsgroup.physics .ntua.gr/Georgakilas.