Iannis Carras is Associate Professor of Balkan and European History at the University of Macedonia in Thessaloniki. He previously served as Senior Lecturer at the IES EU Center and taught at Albert Ludwigs University in Freiburg and the International Hellenic University in Thessaloniki. He earned his doctorate in 2011 from the Faculty of Political Sciences at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, with a dissertation titled Trade and Brotherhood: Balkan Merchants in Russia, 1700–1774. His research focuses  on Balkan communities in Ukraine and the Black Sea region, trade networks, and the intersection of religion and the Enlightenment.