Jordanka Zlatanova is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Molecular Biology at the University of Wyoming. She earned her PhD and DSc degrees in cellular and molecular biology from the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, conducting experiments at the Ernst Boehringer Institute for Drug Research in Vienna, Austria. Zlatanova was Department Head of the Molecular Genetics at the Institute of Genetics in the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences before becoming a Senior Research Professor at Oregon State University. She was also Deputy Director of the Biochip Center at Argonne National Laboratory and a Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Sciences and Engineering at Polytechnic University in Brooklyn, NY. Zlatanova is a member of the Bulgarian Union of Scientists, Biochemistry and Biophysics Section, the Austrian Biochemical Society, and the International Society for Plant Molecular Biology and was the recipient of an International Cancer Research Technology Transfer (ICRETT) Award. She has authored over 150 papers and numerous books and book chapters. Her research interests are in chromatin structure and dynamics and its role in transcription regulation. Kensal E. van Holde is Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at Oregon State University. He earned his PhD in physical chemistry at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. After working as an industrial chemist, he returned to academia and in 1967, he joined the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at Oregon State University, reflecting his evolving interests from polymer chemistry to biology. van Holde has won numerous teaching and education awards, and is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the National Academy of Science. His research has focused on the structure and function of oxygen transport proteins and the structure of chromatin. He is among the world's leading experts in biophysical chemistry and is the author of multiple textbooks.