Dr Dimitris Kardassis obtained his BSc degree from the Department of Biology of the Aristotelian University of Thessaloniki and his PhD degree from the Department of Biochemistry of Boston University Medical Center (BUMC). He was a post-doctoral fellow in the Section of Molecular Genetics of the Whitaker Cardiovascular Institute of BUMC and a short term EMBO fellow at the Institute of Molecular Biology and Tumor Science in Marburg, Germany. He was elected as Assistant Professor of Biochemistry at the Division of Basic Medical Sciences of the University of Crete Medical School in 1998, he was promoted to Associate Professor in 2004 and to Full Professor in 1999. Since 1998, he has been an affiliated faculty member of the Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology of the Foundation for Research and Technology of Hellas (IMBB-FORTH) in Heraklion, in the Group of Gene Regulation and Epigenetics. He has published more than 120 publications in peer reviewed journals and has been invited to present his work in several national and international conferences. He received the Young Investigator Award by the European Atherosclerosis Society. He serves as a co- Editor in the Journal Atherosclerosis Plus (Elsevier) and he has served as Chair and member of the Management Committee of several European COST Actions.