Work with thought leaders and academic experts from The Open University

I am an Associate Professor in Organisational Behaviour and a chartered psychologist. I received my PhD and a MBA from the University of Surrey; awarded a First-class Honour of BSc in Psychology from the Open University. My PhD research investigated the professional identity and disclosure of UK Engineers and was fully funded by the University of Surrey and supported by six professional bodies of engineers in the UK. For my PhD work on identity I received Postdoctoral Research Fellowship funding award by the Economic Social Research Council (ESRC) which enabled me to work as a post doc at the University of Surrey and Linköping University, Sweden.  Following on, I was a Research Fellow in Organisational Behaviour and Research Methods at the School of Management at University of Surrey, and Lecturer in Organisational Behaviour at Surrey Business School. I attained the Fellow status of the UK Higher Education Academy in 2011. My wide variety of experience derived not only from academia but also from industry: voluntary work with non-governmental organisations in Africa and Europe, head of sales and marketing in Asia, business consultant in the UK and project lead in establishing University partnership between University of Surrey and Dongbei University of Finance and Economics, China. This joint academic partnership institution is now known as SII- DUFE. I am currently leading and researching a number of impactful and exciting projects, such as religious identity and working for the NHS, identity conflict and complementarity in a wide range of organisations (banking, law, education, business, and healthcare) and leadership in church organisations in the UK and the USA.

**Santanu Ganguly** works in the fields of **Quantum Machine Learning, AI/ML, Cybersecurity and Quantum technologies**. He has held several senior-level positions at various Silicon Valley vendors.  Santanu is the author of the 2021 book “**Quantum Machine Learning: An Applied Approach**”, published by Apress (Springer-Nature). He is a reviewer of papers and books on AI and quantum computing, such as “*Financial Modelling Using Quantum Computing*”, Packt (2023). Santanu collaborates with the *Intelligent Secure Cyber Systems and Applications Research (ISCAR) Lab*, *Cleveland State University* on research in Quantum Machine Learning and co-authored the following recent paper:  Kumar, Sathish A. P., Temitope Bolaji Adeniyi, Ahmad Alomari and Santanu Ganguly. “*Design of Quantum Machine Learning Course for a Computer Science Program.*” 2023 IEEE International Conference on Quantum Computing and Engineering (QCE) 03 (2023): 68-77. Santanu has so far authored and co-authored six patents encompassing quantum technologies, cloud and security such as the recently published following US patent: Ganguly, Santanu and Achkir, D. Brice. 2023. *Systems and methods for providing user authentication for quantum-entangled communications in a cloud environment*. **US Patent US11818257B1**, filed Apr 27, 2022, and issued Nov 14, 2023. Santanu has an academic and professional background in industry, research and development in network architecture, silicon photonics, quantum technologies, mathematics, astrophysics, cloud, data science and security. He has been an invited speaker at several conferences including IQT and Quantum.Tech. He is an invited speaker for February 2024 session at the Quantum FinTech series at the *Rethink.Labs* governed jointly by Duke University, NCSU  and UNC.  He is a member of The Responsible AI Institute. In his current role, Santanu is an advisor for Qoro, an early stage  quantum startup and aspires to work at the conjunction of AI, communication and quantum technologies.

David Jones is the Professor of Pharmaceutical and Biomaterial Engineering at Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland. He gained a BSc (1st class honors) in Pharmacy (1985), a PhD in Pharmaceutics (1988), and in 2006, a Doctor of Science from Queen’s University of Belfast. In 2014, he gained a BA (1st class honors) in Mathematics and Statistics from the Open University. From 1989–1992, he was a lecturer in Pharmaceutics at the University of Otago, and from 1992–1994, he held the position of Head of Formulations at Norbrook Industries Limited (Northern Ireland). In 1994, he was appointed to a lectureship at the School of Pharmacy, QUB, and was promoted to a Senior Lectureship in 1997. Since 1999, he has held a personal Chair at the School of Pharmacy, Queens University of Belfast.   His research concerns the design, characterisation and engineering of pharmaceutical materials/dosage forms and biomedical devices.  He is the author of three textbooks, 15 patents and >400 research papers/communications. He has been awarded the Lilly Prize for Pharmaceutical Research, the British Pharmaceutical Conference Science Medal Award, the Academy of Pharmaceutical Sciences Innovation Award, the Griffith Medal, and the Chapman Medal from the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, the Academy of Pharmaceutical Sciences Medal Award and the Hanbury Medal from the Royal Pharmaceutical Society.    He is a Chartered Engineer, a Chartered Statistician, and a Chartered Chemist. He has been elected to the Royal Academy of Engineering (FREng), the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci), the Royal Irish Academy (MRIA) and Academia Europaea (MAE), as such, is one of a small group of Academics who have been elected to three national and one European academies.  In addition, he is a fellow of the Pharmaceutical Society of Northern Ireland, the Academy of Pharmaceutical Sciences, the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, the Royal Statistical Society, the Royal Society of Chemistry, and the Irish Academy of Engineering.  Additionally, he is the Editor of the Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmacology and previously held a prestigious Royal Society Industrial Fellowship.    He is a co-founder of Re-Vana Therapeutics, a spin-out company that provides controlled release of biologics from implants to treat sight-threatening ocular diseases ([https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyr39zgj82o](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyr39zgj82o)) and Eutectyx, a company that specializes in bioactive implant design to improve post-operative pain control and infection.  He was awarded a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) on the 2024 King’s Birthday Honours List.