Vincent Brandenburg is nephrologist, associate professor and senior consultant at the Department of Cardiology, Intensive Care Medicine and Vascular Medicine, University Hospital of the RWTH Aachen, Germany. In his current position he is Consultant for the Intermediate Care Unit and Heart Failure outpatient clinic at the same institution (Head: Professor Nikolaus Marx, MD). Dr Brandenburg gained his medical degree in 1998 at the RWTH Aachen and the Ludwig-Maximilians University (LMU) Munich, Germany. In 2005, he completed a two-years postdoctoral research period at the IZKF BioMAT, also at the University Hospital Aachen, under Professor Willi Jahnen-Dechent, PhD, on the subject of the mechanism of extraosseous calcification in uremia. Dr Brandenburg then became a nephrologist at the Department of Nephrology, University Hospital Aachen (Head: Professor Jürgen Floege, MD) until 2009. In his current department, Dr Brandenburg is conducting clinical research on the pathophysiology and treatment of renal osteodystrophy, bone disease after renal transplantation, and cardiovascular calcification in chronic kidney disease, including calciphylaxis. Dr. Brandenburg has been leader of the German Calciphylaxis registry (www.calciphylaxie.de) since 2007. He is also board member of the ERA-EDTA scientific working group “CKD-MBD”. As such, he is currently initiating a multinational European calciphylaxis registry “EuCalNet” (www.calciphylaxis.net). His basic research interests are mechanisms of cardiovascular disease in uremia with particular focus upon vitamin K and oral anticoagulation. He is currently also conducting research about the role of fetuin-A, FGF23, cardiovascular effects of vitamin D and Wnt/beta-catenin signalling in the bone-vascular axis in uremia. Prof. Brandenburg is also principal investigator of several prospective human intervention trials investigating interventions against cardiovascular calcification progression. The clinical focus is the chronic cardio-renal syndrome. Dr Brandenburg has authored or co-authored over 120 articles in peer reviewed journals. These articles have had the primary focus upon chronic kidney disease – mineral and bone disorder, cardiorenal syndrome, and calciphylaxis. He is member of the German and European societies of nephrology and the societies of cardiology.

Robert Lindsay, MBChB, PhD, FRCP is Chief of Internal Medicine at Helen Hayes Hospital in West Haverstraw, New York. A Professor of Clinical Medicine at Columbia University, Dr Lindsay has authored over 300 journal articles, abstracts, and book chapters on osteoporosis and metabolic bone disease. A graduate of the University of Glasgow, where he received his BSc, MBChB, PhD, and FRCP, Dr Lindsay completed an internship and residency in medicine at the Western Infirmary in Glasgow and an internship in surgery at the Southern General Hospital in Glasgow. He is an Accredited Specialist in Internal Medicine and Endocrinology with the Royal College of Physicians, a Fellow of the American College of Nutrition, a Fellow of the American College of Endocrinology, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine, and a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons. Dr Lindsay is also a member of the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research from which he received the Bartter Award for excellence in clinical research in 1997. He is also a member of the Endocrine Society, the American College of Physicians and is past President of the National Osteoporosis Foundation, and is the 1999 recipient of the Scientific Leadership Award of the Foundation.

Biographic Information for Andrea Z. LaCroix, PhD Dr. LaCroix is Professor and Chief of Epidemiology in the Department of Family Medicine and Public Health at the University of California, San Diego. She is also the Director of the Women’s Health Center of Excellence at UCSD. She has an extensive research program devoted to studies on factors associated with healthy aging in older women and men. She has conducted numerous randomized clinical trials and observational studies on the prevention of cancer, fracture, heart disease, and frailty in postmenopausal, as well as large, prospective studies of exceptional aging and maintaining physical and cognitive function into later life. Prior to joining the faculty of UCSD in October 2013, Dr. LaCroix was Co-Principal Investigator of the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) Clinical Coordinating Center at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington. Her work within the WHI program includes evaluating the longterm effects of hormone therapy and calcium/Vitamin D supplementation on chronic disease outcomes including heart disease, cancer and fracture. She was also Co-Principal Investigator of the Data Coordinating Center for the Menopausal Symptoms: Finding Lasting Answers for Symptoms and Health (MsFLASH) clinical trials network, an NIA initiative to expedite the testing of new interventions for menopause symptoms. In addition, she continues work on healthy aging studies as a Senior Scientific Investigator at the Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute (KPWHRI) in Seattle where she has collaborated on the Adult Changes in Thought (ACT) cohort study investigating risk factors for cognitive health and dementia for over 20 years. Dr. LaCroix also lead a NIA-funded T32 training program entitled, “Improving Healthcare for Aging Women” at KPWHRI for the past 10 years. Dr. LaCroix received her doctoral degree in epidemiology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1984, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in cardiovascular disease at The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD in 1985. Before coming to Seattle, WA in 1989, Dr. LaCroix was a federal government epidemiologist at the National Center for Health Statistics and then the National Institute on Aging. She served on the National Advisory Council on Aging for the National Institutes of Health, National Institute on Aging from 2009-2012. In 2010, she received the McDougall Mentoring award which recognizes and honors faculty members who demonstrate an outstanding investment in their mentees’ professional development and success as independent researchers or clinical scientists. In 2014, Dr. LaCroix was elected as a member of the American Epidemiological Society. She has authored over 400 scientific publications, and was selected as a Thomson Reuters Highly Cited Researcher in 2014.

Dr Vicky MacRae is a Reader and Group Leader at The Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh, and has research interests in mechanisms of physiological and pathological calcification. She has investigated a number of novel calcification regulators including sclerostin, bisphosphonates, ENPP1 and testosterone.

Felicia Cosman, M.D., is the Medical Director of the Clinical Research Center at Helen Hayes Hospital and Professor of Medicine at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York. Dr. Cosman is a graduate of Cornell University and Stony Brook Medical School. She received her internal medicine training and completed her endocrinology fellowship at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center in New York City. Dr. Cosman’s research includes studies on the causes of osteoporosis and how estrogen, SERMS, vitamin D, bisphosphonates, and other therapies work as treatments for osteoporosis. She has also studied the causes of stress fractures and factors influencing the acquisition of peak bone mass. In addition, Dr. Cosman has been involved in many research studies evaluating the effectiveness and safety of investigational osteoporosis medications. A major research focus over the last decade has been on the use of bone building anabolic medications, alone and in combination or sequence with antiresorptive agents, and in novel cyclic regimens for the treatment of patients with severe osteoporosis. She has also been a major contributor to the areas of vertebral fracture identification and goal directed osteoporosis treatment. She is the recipient of multiple research grants from the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Defense, the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, and multiple pharmaceutical companies. Dr. Cosman has published over 140 peer-reviewed articles in the osteoporosis field and countless book chapters. Most recently, she was selected as Editor-in- Chief of Osteoporosis International. Osteoporosis International (OI) is an international multi- disciplinary journal, a joint initiative of the International Osteoporosis Foundation and the US National Osteoporosis Foundation.