Prof. Dr. Marco Durante is Director of the Biophysics Department at GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research (Darmstadt, Germany) and Full Professor of Physics at the Technical University of Darmstadt. He is also Professor of Physics at the University of Naples Federico II in Italy, and at the Gunma College of Medicine in Japan.

Dr. Durante got his Ph.D. in physics in 1992 and has dedicated his research efforts to the biophysics of high-energy charged particles, with applications in cancer therapy and space radiation protection. He is generally recognized as world leader in the field of particle radiobiology and medical physics and is co-author of over 300 papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals (h-index=45) and one patent on proton therapy (EU patent WO2013083333). He is currently chair of the ESA Life Sciences Advisory Group and of the ESA Topical Team on Space Radiation, vice-chair of the Particle Therapy Co-Operative Group (PTCOG), member of the technical-scientific Committee of the Italian Hadrontherapy Center (CNAO) and of the Program Advisory Committee of the GANIL (Caen, France), KVI (Groningen, The Netherlands), iThemba (South Africa), and Rez (Czech Republic) accelerators. Dr. Durante was President of the International Association for Radiation Research (IARR) 2011-15, and is Associate Editor in several International scientific journals (Br. J. Radiol., Int. J. Particle Ther., Int. J. Radiat. Biol., Phys. Med., Radiat. Environ. Biophys., J. Radiat. Res., Life Sci. Space Res., JINST, Front. Oncol.).

He has been awarded several prizes for his contributions to charged particle biophysics, including the 2004 Galileo Galilei Award in Medical Physics, the 60th Timofeeff-Ressovsky medal by the Russian Academy of Sciences, the 8th Warren K. Sinclair Award of the US National Academy of Sciences, the 2013 IBA-Europhysics Award for Applied Nuclear Science and Nuclear Methods in Medicine (European Physics Society), the 2013 Bacq & Alexander award of the European Radiation Research Society (ERRS), and the 2019 Martin Schneider memorial lecture of the University of Texas Medical Branch (Galveston, TX).