Marcelo F. Vela, MD, MSCR, Associate Professor of Medicine, is the director of the gastrointestinal motility program at Baylor Clinic and the Michael E. DeBakey Veteran Affairs Medical Center, Houston, TX, USA. Dr. Vela is a nationally recognized specialist in esophageal diseases, swallowing disorders, and gastrointestinal motility.

Dr John E. Pandolfino is Assistant Professor, Division of Gastroenterology at Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA. Dr Pandolfino has published extensively on gastrointestinal complications in surgery, pH monitoring of esophageal acid exposure, clinical use of esophageal manometry, and therapies and management of disorders of gastrointestinal motility. His research interests include esophageal physiology, gastroesophageal reflux disease, swallowing disorders, and esophageal diseases.

Joel E Richter MD is Richard L Evans Professor and Chair, Department of Medicine, Temple University School of Medicine, Philadelphia, PA, USA. He specializes in the diagnosis and management of, and performs clinical research on, esophageal diseases including Barrett's oesophagus, GERD (including its extraesophageal presentation), achalasia and other motility disorders, non-cardiac chest pain, dysphagia and the effects that H. pylori has on the oesophagus. He has published more than 500 articles, chapters and books. He is the current co-Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of Gastroenterology and past President of the American College of Gastroenterology and World Organization for Specialized Studies on Diseases of the Esophagus.
Dr Richter has 338 articles on PubMed, and is editor of the following books: Ambulatory Esophageal Ph Monitoring: Practical Approach and Clinical Applications; Dysphagia: Diagnosis and Treatment; Gerd: Current Issues and Controversies; Textbook of Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, 2nd edition (May 2012); The Esophagus, 5th edition (published March 2012).