Upendra K. Sharma received his PhD degree (2011) in organic chemistry under the supervision of Dr. Arun K. Sinha at CSIR-Institute of Himalayan Bioresource Technology, Palampur, India. Thereafter, he worked as Assistant Professor (Chemistry) at National Institute of Technology (NIT), Jalandhar, India. Later on, he joined the research group of Prof. Erik Van der Eycken, University of Leuven, Belgium as postdoctoral fellow and till now has published more than 40 publications in reputed international journals. After short postdoctoral stints in the lab of Prof. Dr. Steven Ley (University of Cambridge) and Dr. Timothy Noël (University of Eindhoven), he is continuing in the lab of Prof. Van der Eycken as a senior postdoctoral research associate. His research interests include the development of new synthetic methods for biologically relevant molecules employing modern methods of synthesis viz. flow chemistry, photoredox catalysis and transition metal catalyzed C-H functionalizations.

Erik Van der Eycken received his PhD degree (1987) in organic chemistry from the University of Ghent, with Professor Maurits Vandewalle. During 1988 to 1992 he worked as a scientific researcher at the R&D laboratories of AGFA-Gevaert, Belgium, and moved back to the University of Ghent in 1992. In 1997 he became a Doctor Assistant at the University of Leuven (KU Leuven). He spent time as a visiting scientist at the University of Graz (C. Oliver Kappe), at The Scripps Research Institute (K. Barry Sharpless), and at Uppsala University (Mats Larhed, Anders Hallberg). He was appointed Professor at the University of Leuven (KU Leuven) in 2007. His research interests span the breadth of microwave chemistry, multicomponent reactions and post-functionalizations to generate small to medium sized rings as well as developing new methods for the synthesis of heteroaromatic compounds of biological interest.