Joseph Straus, Professor of Law (Universities of Munich and Ljubljana), Doctor Honoris Causa (Dr. jur. h.c.), University of Ljubljana and University of Kragujevac, Director of the Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property, Competition Law and Tax Law, Munich and Chairman of the Managing Board, Munich Intellectual Property Law Center; Marshall B. Coyne Visiting Professor of International and Comparative Law, George Washington University School of Law, Honorary Professor, Faculty of Law Tongji University Shanghai and Honorary Professor of Huazhong University of Science and Technology and Honorary Director of the Chinese-German Institute of Intellectual Property Huazhong University in Wuhan, Honorary Director of the Institute of Intellectual Property, Tongji University Shanghai; Distinguished Visiting Professor of Law, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto (2005); Visiting Professor of Law, Cornell University Law School, Ithaca, N.Y. (between 1989 and 1998). Author or co-author of more than 250 publications in the field of intellectual property law, especially in the field of the protection of biotechnological inventions. Consultant to OECD, WIPO, UNCTAD, UNIDO, EC-Commission, World Bank, Scientific Services of the German Parliament and the German Government, as well as the European Parliament, the European Patent Organisation, the Swiss Government and the Swiss Federal Institute for Intellectual Property. Active in many international associations, e.g. Chair Intellectual Property Rights Committee of the Human Genome Organisation (HUGO), Chair Programme Committee, International Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property (AIPPI), former President, International Association for the Advancement of Teaching and Research in Intellectual Property (ATRIP). Member and Dean of the Class of Social, Legal and Economic Sciences of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts and member of the Academia Europaea. Corresponding Member of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts. Recipient of the Science Award 2000 of the Foundation for German Science. Member of the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Centers List of Neutrals. Selected as one of the 50 2004s most influential people in Intellectual Property, by the Journal "Managing Intellectual Property" in 2004 and 2005.