Dr Reena Rajasuriar is a Clinical Pharmacist by training and an Associate Professor at the Department of Medicine, University Malaya (UM).  She also holds an adjunct position as a Fellow at the Department of Infectious Diseases, University of Melbourne, Australia.  She leads the research unit at the Department of Medicine, UM and is Head of the Immunotherapeutics Laboratory (ITL), a core immunology research laboratory at the Faculty of Medicine, UM.    Dr Rajasuriar completed her PhD in Immunogenetics at Monash University, Australia and now leads a translational research program in HIV and Aging at the Centre of Excellence for Research in AIDS (CERiA).  Her training as a clinical and basic scientist has afforded Dr Rajasuriar the expertise to perform multidisciplinary research spanning basic, clinical and implementation studies.  Her research focuses on understanding drivers of accelerated aging in people living with HIV and its interaction with functional aging outcomes.  She is also invested in understanding how integrated HIV care can best be implemented in resource limited settings to promote healthy aging.   Dr Rajasuriar has published extensively on the intersection of HIV and aging, and is an international leader in advancing the knowledge in this field, having delivered multiple plenaries at international forums, co-authored multiple opinion pieces and viewpoints as well as contributed to the development of consensus statements around this subject matter.  Together with members of her team, she was instrumental in developing the first ECHO training program on HIV and Aging for the Asia Pacific region to advance capacity building for health professionals providing care for people with HIV.  She is also the Principal Investigator of the only HIV and aging cohort in the Asia Pacific region studying aging from a multidimensional perspective, with over a decade of follow up (2014-2024).   Dr Rajasuriar’s work is funded by various national and international funding bodies including the National Institutes of Health, US, the American Foundation for AIDS Research and the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, Malaysia.  She has received multiple accolades including the Australia-APEC Women in Research Fellowship (2015), the Loreal-UNESCO For Women in Science Malaysia Fellowship (2016), the IAS Research-for-Cure Academy Fellowship (2018), the CIRA International Visiting Fellowship to Yale (2019), the Asian Universities Alliance (AUA) Scholars Award (2023) and most recently, the Fulbright Malaysian Scholar Award (2024). 

Dr. Noorhayati Idros holds a Bachelor’s degree (Hons.) in Electrical & Electronics Engineering from Universiti Tenaga Nasional, Malaysia, and an M.Sc. in Nanoelectronics from The University of Manchester, United Kingdom. Her M.Sc. research at Manchester focused on the fabrication of polymer-based thin-film transistors (OTFTs), examining the effects of elevated temperatures on OTFT performance and the active layer's morphology. Following her M.Sc., Dr. Idros joined the Centre for Photonic Devices and Sensors Group at Cambridge University’s Department of Engineering as a Ph.D. candidate. Her doctoral research centered on developing biochemical sensors to detect water contaminants, specifically targeting explosives like 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene (TNT) and heavy metals. This interdisciplinary work utilized aptamer/DNA and chemically functionalized nanophotonic crystal surfaces, integrating microfluidics paper-based devices, sensitive optical detection, and systematic colorimetric analysis in RGB-space via digital imaging and color calibration. Her sensors were designed for low-cost, portable applications. Dr. Idros is an alumnus of Corpus Christi College, University of Cambridge (UCAM), and was active in university sports, serving as netball team captain for the Cambridge University Malaysia Society and as a netball player for the Malaysian Students' Society of Manchester. Upon completing her Ph.D., Dr. Idros continued as a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge, where she developed fluorescence-based biochemical sensors for detecting heavy metals in water for Peruvian environmental projects. She also conducted environmental quality assessments in the Rio Cañete drainage basin, using Andean River Shrimp as a bioindicator species. This work involved DNA barcoding for species identification and dietary analysis of the shrimp. Dr. Idros also trained university staff and students in laboratory and field methods, presented her findings, and contributed to the PERU-UCAM staff and student exchange program. In addition to her academic accomplishments, Dr. Idros brings significant industry experience from her time as an engineer at Intel Microelectronics Sdn. Bhd., where she supported System Windows Hardware Quality Labs (WHQL) testing for Vista and XP PV milestones, executed CPU and platform test plans, and led Vista Debug installations for CPU Product Release Qualification (PRQ). She also contributed to the Mobile Internet Device (MID) project and gained expertise in Linux-based application porting, as well as electrical and electronics debugging. Currently, Dr. Idros is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Electrical Engineering at Universiti Malaya and a Core Member of the Centre of Printable Electronics, specializing in the development of nanotechnology-based sensors for water quality and environmental monitoring. 

Ranita Hisham is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Library & Information Science, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Universiti Malaya. She has 15 years of experience working at the Universiti Malaya Library as a Senior Librarian before joining the academia in December 2023. She worked at the Medical Library and actively participated with the Medical Librarian Group (MLG), Librarian Association of Malaysia as the Secretary from 2020 until 2023. She graduated with her Bachelor's Degree in Library Science and a Masters in Information Management from UiTM. She obtained her PhD from the Faculty of Medicine, Universiti Malaya in 2019. Her doctoral research focused on exploring the views and experiences of primary care physicians regarding evidence-based medicine in Malaysia. This work presents a new paradigm of how librarians should approach evidence-based research in medicine. She has published her work and collaborated with researchers from various backgrounds in prestigious journals. She was trained in Evidence-Based Medicine searching skills. She has also conducted many workshops and talks on Literature Search for Systematic Reviews and provides consultations on literature searches for systematic reviews for students and academicians.