Dr. Nurshamimi was awarded a Malaysia-Imperial Doctoral Programme to study HPV regulation at the Department of Virology, St. Mary’s Campus, Imperial College London, upon graduating with an M.Med.Sc from the University of Malaya in 2008. She joined the Department of Molecular Medicine as a Senior Lecturer in 2014 and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2021. She was a three-time travel award winner for attending HKU-Pasteur workshops at the University of Hong Kong. She also received travel awards from the International Papillomavirus Society in 2017 for the HPV conference in South Africa and a travel award from the EMBL Advanced Training Centre Corporate Partnership Program Fellowship in 2015 for the EMBO Conference in Heidelberg, Germany. She is also a member of the European Association for Cancer Research (EACR) and the European Society for Virology. In 2020, she won the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Young Investigator Award for her work on the Chikungunya virus, and in 2022, she received a travel award from Keystone Symposia, Global Health Travel Award, USA. In 2024, she was selected by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, USA, to present her work entitled "Morindone from Morinda citrifolia—A promising agent targeting DNA replication and key mutations in colorectal cancer" at their conference 'Mechanisms and Models of Cancer'. Dr. Nurshamimi also holds several patents in the field of anti-aging and colorectal cancer. Her current research is geared toward phase 1 clinical trials for diabetic foot ulcer treatment and investigating potential leads for colorectal cancer targets. She is an Ambassador for Bentham Science Publisher, one of the most renowned ISI publishers in the world. Currently, she is a principal investigator for research projects on colorectal cancer, Zika and dengue viruses, anti-aging, and diabetic foot ulcers.

Professor Dr Hong Ching Goh, an interdisciplinary social scientist, studies human-environment interactions. Initially focused on urban planning and nature-based tourism, her approach has evolved to encompass sustainability, relevance, inclusion, and impact of scales. Her research inquiry explores how diverse communities benefit from nature, e.g., livelihood, health and wellbeing and intangible values. She investigates the threats and constraints posed by various anthropogenic actions and governance systems on the environment, and devises strategies for its safeguarding. This focus stems from her academic training in urban planning, tourism planning, and geography. Her research, with wide-ranging applications in urbanized environments, resource-rich regions and protected areas, draws inspiration from her fieldwork in Sabah since 2005, which has then driven her interdisciplinary coastal research in Southeast Asia. Currently attached to the Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Faculty of Built Environment, Prof. Goh also leads the Humanities and Social Sciences Group of the Malaysia National Antarctic Research Centre. She's a registered town planner with the Malaysian Institute of Planners and the Board of Town Planners Malaysia.  Prof Goh serves as the country coordinator for ForUm, a DAAD-funded network for Urban Futures in Southeast Asia that connects SEA and German experts since 2018. She also continues to serve on GYA membership selection and output review committees. Her commitment to interdisciplinary research has been significantly influenced by being a recipient of the MIT-UTM Malaysian Sustainable Cities Program Fellowship and the DAAD Doctoral Scholarship Awards where she conducted her doctoral study in the Center of Development Research (ZEF), as well as her memberships in ASEAN Science Leadership Program and Global Young Academy (GYA).  Since 2009, she has secured RM6.9 million in research grants, including RM4.95 million internationally. As a co-investigator, she helped secure the GBP6.4 million Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) grant. Her contributions to interdisciplinary research, particularly in marine environments and coastal communities, have earned recognition. This recognition was highlighted by the British High Commission in Kuala Lumpur in 2021. In the same year, she was invited to join the UK Minister of Science, Amanda Solloway, and Professor Melanie Austen (University of Plymouth, UK) to discuss climate change impacts on marine environments and coastal communities in the Blue Communities program. In 2022, she was featured among the '100 Women Scientists in Global Polar Research. In 2024, she is appointed as the DAAD Research Ambassador in Malaysia in recognition of her outstanding contribution towards furthering the academic & scientific cooperation between Malaysia and Germany and awarded the Top Research Scientists Malaysia Award by the Academy of Sciences Malaysia.   To date, she has published more than 65 peer-reviewed articles, 30 book chapters and books, and other 40 publications. She has supervised nine PhD students and three master students to completion and oversees 10 ongoing students. 

Dr. Noor Munirah Isa is a senior lecturer at the Department of Science and Technology Studies, Faculty of Science, Universiti Malaya. Her Ph.D. in bioethics, which she received from the same department in 2013, provided her with a solid foundation for her research in this fascinating multidisciplinary field of study. Dr. Isa has had a lifelong interest in Islam, Muslim, and science. This interest was inspired by medieval Muslim polymaths and was further cultivated when she studied biotechnology and Islamic studies for her bachelor’s degree. She was part of the first batch of students to graduate from the Universiti Malaya Applied Science with Islamic Studies undergraduate program in September 2007. This unique program provided her with the opportunity to study science and religion in an interdisciplinary manner, which has been a driving force behind her research to this day. Dr. Isa's doctoral thesis was a study on how Muslim scholars assess selected applications of modern biotechnology from an Islamic perspective and how they view conventional perspectives in this regard. Her research has continued to focus on the intersection of science, technology, and society, and she has been especially interested in the interplay between science and Islam, bioethics, and science communication. She believes that these areas are crucial for bridging the scientific community and society, and for promoting public engagement and trust in science. In 2014-2016, Dr. Isa conducted a small research project aimed at examining the role of Malay science fiction novels in communicating ethics in science and technology to the Malaysian public. This was followed by a larger project, which she led, that explored the Islamic perspectives on human germline gene editing. This project was funded by the Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia and provided Dr. Isa and her team with the opportunity to explore the Islamic worldview and to expound on Islamic ethical-legal concepts and principles related to human germline gene editing. Dr. Isa is also a co-investigator in a project on developing standards for using kratom leaves for medical purposes. In addition to studying Islamic perspectives, she is also interested in cross-cultural studies of religious and cultural perspectives on bioethics. Her interest in this area has been recognized by the Global Forum on Bioethics of Research Project Fellowship from Wellcome Trust, which she received to study the ethics of human genome editing from Islamic and Confucian perspectives. She was also awarded the Asian Universities Alliance (AUA) Scholars Award 2020-2021, which enabled her to explore the influence of religion on bioethics in Thailand, where Buddhism is the official religion. Dr. Isa recognizes that science communication is a crucial area of research that has been underexplored in Malaysia. With this in mind, she has attempted to fill this gap by conducting small projects with postgraduate students on Malaysian public knowledge, awareness, and attitudes toward various topics, including vaccination, dengue fever, and medical cannabis. Through these projects, she aims to better understand public perception towards science and technology and to identify the factors that contribute to public trust in science.