Dr Helena Varkkey is an Associate Professor of Political Ecology at the Department of International and Strategic Studies, Universiti Malaya. Her areas of expertise include transboundary haze governance in Southeast Asia and global palm oil politics. Her monograph on “The Haze Problem in Southeast Asia: Palm Oil and Politics” was published by Routledge in 2016. Her latest book is a collection of essays on the politics of haze and the environment in Southeast Asia called “The Forests for the Palms” published by ISEAS Singapore in 2021. Dr Helena has almost two decades of experience in qualitative research, including conducting fieldwork, interviews, and focus groups among various government and non-government stakeholders, and has built up extensive research networks in countries across ASEAN. She has edited and produced reports for the Academy of Sciences Malaysia, UNICEF, and the ASEAN Secretariat.

Professor Dato’ Ir. Dr. Mohd. Hamdi Abd. Shukor received his Bachelor of Engineering (Mechanical) with Honours from Imperial College, London, England; a Master of Science degree in Advanced Manufacturing and Management Technology from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology, United Kingdom; and a Doctor of Engineering degree from Kyoto University, Japan. His academic career commenced in 1995 in Universiti Malaya (UM) as a tutor and he later became a lecturer in the Department of Engineering Design and Manufacture in 1997. He was then appointed as the Head, Department of Engineering Design and Manufacture (2003-2006). He was promoted to Associate Professor in 2006 and then served as a full Professor (Professor C) in 2010. He was promoted to a Senior Professor (Professor B) in 2014 and in 2019 as Senior Professor (Professor A). In 2021, he was promoted to the distinguised post of Senior Professor Turus III.   Prof Hamdi was the former Dean, Faculty of Engineering, (2009-2011) and the former UM Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic and International) (2011-2013). He was appointed as the Vice-Chancellor of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia in Jan 2019 and in November 2020, he assumed the role of leading Universiti Malaya as the 13th Vice-Chancellor until Oct 2023. At the national level, he hold top leadership positions of great repute including as Chairman of the Public Universities Rectors/Vice-Chancellors Committee; Chairman of the Engineering Accreditation Council (EAC), Board Member of the Board of Engineers Malaysia (BEM) and Council Member of the Institute of Engineers Malaysia (IEM). He was a Visiting Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 2015-2016. He was appointed as the Executive President of Asian Universities Alliance (AUA) from 2021-2022 and was a Steering Committee Member of Asia Pacific Rims Universities (APRU) 2022-2023. He is currently a Council Member of the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU) 2022-2025 and the Administrative Board Member of the International Association of Universities (IAU) 2022-2026. He is also being appointed a member of the Board of Trustee of The University of Sarjah, UAE (2023-2026). In addition to producing more than 222 impactful publications in journals indexed by the Web of Science, he also has recorded a WoS h-index of 44 with total citation of over 8,381. In recognition of his outstanding service and contribution, Dato' Mohd. Hamdi was conferred the Darjah Johan Mangku Negara (J.M.N.) by KDYMM Seri Paduka Baginda Yang di-Pertuan Agong in 2019 and also Darjah Dato’ Paduka Negeri Sembilan (D.P.N.S.), which carries the title of Dato' by DYMM Yang di-Pertuan Besar Negeri Sembilan in 2020.                                                                                                   ---------------------------    

Jeannie Wong studied Biomedical Engineering, followed by a Master of Medical Physics at the Universiti Malaya. She received her PhD from the University of Wollongong, Australia. She started her career at the Department of Biomedical Imaging, Faculty of Medicine, the University of Malaya, as a senior lecturer in 2011. She coordinates the UM Master of Medical Physics programme, which is accredited by the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine (IPEM), UK. It is the only postgraduate medical physics programme outside the UK and Ireland that has this accreditation. During her PhD study, she was instrumental in the development of a new field of medical dosimetry in radiation therapy quality assurance with high spatial resolution semiconductor dosimetry and its applications in radiation therapy quality assurance. She has since further extended her research to include dosimetry in diagnostic imaging and patient-specific dosimetry. She has published more than 80 papers to date. She was promoted to associate professor in 2018 and full professorship in 2024. Her research interests include radiation dosimetry, radiotherapy, medical imaging and radiomics. She had supervised 1 postdoctoral candidate, 15 PhD students (7 completed), 3 masters by research students (2 completed), and more than 54 masters by coursework students (49 completed). Dr Wong has vast experience in the teaching of physics and biostatistics at the postgraduate level. She has been involved as a lecturer and examiner for the Master of Radiology and Master of Clinical Oncology at the University of Malaya since 2012. Her research interests are radiation dosimetry, medical imaging, radiotherapy and radiomics. IN 2019, she received the Southeast Asian Federation of Organizations of Medical Physics (SEAFOMP) Young Leader Award.