Markus Cornberg is Clinical Director of the HZI (Helmholtz-Zentrum für Infektionsforschung) and Director of the Centre for Individualised Infection Medicine (CIIM).

Benjamin Maasoumy, MD, is a senior attending physician and research group leader at Hannover Medical School.

Dr. Maasoumy studied medicine in Hannover (Germany), Manchester (UK), and Cape Town (South Africa). During his studies, he was awarded a scholarship from the German National Foundation (Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes). Dr. Maasoumy qualified as a doctor in 2011 and became a resident physician in the Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Endocrinology at Hannover Medical School in the same year. In 2018 and 2020 he finished his specialty training in internal medicine and gastroenterology, respectively.

Dr. Maasoumy started his research in the field of Hepatology during his studies. He investigated hepatic transcription factors for his doctorial thesis between 2007 and 2008. Since 2011 he was responsible for several clinical and diagnostic research projects in viral hepatitis and involved in several phase I-III trials. In 2012 he was selected for a research fellowship at the Integrated Research and Treatment Center Transplantation (IFB-Tx). Since 2017 Dr. Maasoumy is leading a clinical research group on various aspects of decompensated liver cirrhosis with a special interest on ascites, systemic inflammation and bacterial infections. He has published more than 70 scientific articles on liver disease and serves as a reviewer for several journals such as the Journal of Hepatology, Alimentary Pharmacology & Therapeutics and Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology. Since 2019 he is an Associated Editor of the journal “Liver International”.

Arndt Vogel, MD, is managing senior consultant and professor in the Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Endocrinology at Hannover Medical School. He is head of the GI-Cancer Center at Medical School Hannover and is part of the endoscopy team.

Heiner Wedemeyer is Professor and Chairman of the Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Endocrinology at Hannover Medical School since April 1, 2020. He was Professor and Chairman of the Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology at the University Clinic Essen from February 2018 to April 2020.

He received his medical degree from the University of Göttingen in 1996 and subsequently started his training in Internal Medicine at Hannover Medical School in Germany. From 1998 to 2000, he was a research fellow in immunology at the Liver Diseases Branch, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, USA. Since 2001, he completed his training in Internal Medicine and Gastroenterology at Hannover Medical School, where he became Professor of Medicine in 2011.

Professor Wedemeyer has been involved in the scientific coordination of the German Network of Competence on Viral Hepatitis (Hep-Net) and the German Liver Foundation for more than 15 years. Currently, he serves as the Managing Director of the German Hepatitis C-Registry. Heiner Wedemeyer is member of several scientific organizations and was Secretary General of the European Association for the Study of the Liver from 2009 to 2011.

Professor Wedemeyer has a long-term research interest in liver diseases with a main focus on viral hepatitis, liver transplantation and hepatocellular carcinoma. He has been principal investigator in numerous clinical trials, focusing on antiviral therapy and immunotherapy of viral hepatitis B, C, D and E. He has authored over 500 original articles; his current Hirsch-Index is 98 (google scholar; March 2021) and his work has been quoted more than 42.000 times.

Heiner Wedemeyer has received numerous awards including the Hans Popper Award of the International Association of the Study of the Liver in 2002, the Innovation Award of the German Medical Faculties (2011) and the Rudolph-Schoen-Awards (2011). His research has been funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, the German Ministry of Research and Education, the European Union, the European Association for the Study of the Liver and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.