Conference Chairpersons
Peter Borchmann
Cologne, Germany
University Hospital Cologne
Peter Borchmann
Peter Borchmann is Assistant Medical Director in the Department of Hematology and Oncology at the University Hospital of Cologne and head of the lymphoma program including the CAR T-cell therapy phase I/II unit. He is head of the certified center for hematological malignancies of the University Hospital of Cologne. As Co-Chairman of the German Hodgkin Study Group (GHSG) he is responsible for development of investigator initiated clinical studies. He is an active member of the German Society for Hematology and Oncology (DGHO), the European Hematology Association (EHA), and the American Society of Hematology (ASH).
Ulrich Jäger
Vienna, Austria
Medical University of Vienna, Vienna General Hospital
Ulrich Jäger
Ulrich Jäger is Professor of Hematology and Head of the Division of Hematology and Hemostaseology at the Medical University of Vienna. He served as president of the European Hematology Association from 2011 to 2013. He gained his professional experience at the Medical University of Vienna and at Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri. He is currently leading a hematology institute which focuses on translational research and precision medicine.
Dr Jäger’s scientific interests are molecular hematology, molecular biology and immunotherapy of leukemias and lymphomas, minimal residual disease, molecular mechanisms of chromosomal translocations and chronic lymphocytic leukemia with a focus on personalized precision medicine as well as CAR-T cell therapies. He is or was the leader of several international studies in lymphoma. His laboratory and department are cooperating with numerous institutions in Europe, the United States and Asia. He has received several scientific awards and has published a large number of original articles, review articles, and book chapters.
Marie José Kersten
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
LYMMCARE (Lymphoma and Myeloma Center Amsterdam)
Marie José Kersten
Marie José Kersten is a professor of hematology at the department of Hematology at Amsterdam UMC in Amsterdam. B cell malignancies are the main focus of research in this department, which together with the departments of Pathology and Experimental Immunology forms the basis for the LYMMCARE Institute (Lymphoma and Myeloma Center Amsterdam). Marie José Kersten is involved in several research projects and she is the principal investigator for several phase I/II clinical trials focusing on the biology and treatment of NHL, Waldenstrom’s macroglobulinemia and Hodgkin lymphoma. She is the chair of the EHA (European Hematology Association) Scientific Working Group Lymphoma and a co-founder and chair of the Lunenburg Lymphoma Phase I/II Consortium (LLPC). The main focus of the LLPC is to perform early clinical trials (from first-in-man trials to early phase II trials) in patients with lymphoma. She has been and is involved in many CAR T-cell clinical trials and in several research projects concerning side effects and quality of life in CAR T-cell treated patients.
Faculty
Peter Bader
Frankfurt, Germany
University Hospital Frankfurt
Peter Bader
Peter Bader, MD is Professor of Paediatrics at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt a. M., Germany. He received his medical degree from the Eberhard-Karls-University in Tübingen. Since October 2004 he is Head of the Division for Stem Cell Transplantation and Immunology and Vice Director of the University Children’s Hospital in Frankfurt a. M., Germany.
From 2014 to 2018 Prof. Bader was chairman of the Pediatric Diseases Working Party (PDWP) of the European Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation (EBMT). In March 2019 he was Co-President of the 45th Annual EBMT Meeting in Frankfurt.
His research is focused in particular on pre emptive strategies to prevent relapse after allogeneic stem cell transplantation in children and adolescence with malignant diseases
as well as the development and application of innovative cell therapy.
André Baruchel
Paris, France
University Hospital Robert Debré
André Baruchel
After medical studies at University Paris Descartes, André Baruchel has been trained in Pediatric Hemato-Oncology as a fellow in Saint-Louis Hospital. He specialized in the field of pediatric leukemias on both the laboratory aspects (MRD studies, clonal evolution) and clinical research finally becoming the leader of the FRench Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia Group (FRALLE), with an emphasis on the adolescent field. He still is the current chair of the national ALL protocol. After the merging of 2 pediatric hematology departments at the Robert Debré University Hospital, he oriented its interest in the new drugs field and became an elected member of the ITCC consortium executive board. He has served for 10 years as a DMC member of the Children’s Oncology Group (North America) and has been part of the International Member Committee of the American Society of Hematology.
Over the last six years, he particularly focused on the CAR-T cells area, Robert Debré being the first authorized center in France for pediatrics.
Chiara Bonini
Milan, Italy
IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele
Chiara Bonini
Chiara Bonini, M.D., Professor of Hematology at the University Vita-Salute, San Raffaele, Head of the Experimental Hematology Unit and Deputy Director of the Division of Immunology, Transplantation and Infectious Diseases of OSR. She was trained in Milano (Ospedale San Raffaele – OSR), New York (MSKCC) and Seattle (FHCRC). She has been a member of the Boards of ESGCT and ASGCT and chair of the EBMT CTIWP. She is currently member of the ASH Awards and Global Research Award Committees, of the Board of ESH, member of the EHA Subcommittee on Cellular Therapy and Councelor of the Board of EHA. Her main research focus is allogeneic stem cell transplantation and the development, preclinical and clinical validation of cell and gene therapy approaches to treat cancer.
Jochen Büchner
Oslo, Norway
Oslo University Hospital
Jochen Büchner
Jochen Büchner, MD PhD, is a pediatrician and senior consultant at the Department of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Oslo University Hospital. He received his medical degree from the University Medical School in Freiburg, Germany, and his PhD on miRNAs in neuroblastoma. Since 2014, he is the Clinical Director of the national Pediatric Stem Cell Transplantation program in Oslo. Current research focuses on ALL, MDS/SAA, HSCT and other cellular and immunotherapies, including early phase clinical trials and engineered T cells. Since 2015, principle investigator on several multicenter CAR-T cell trials in pediatric ALL/lymphoma and in charge of the pediatric CAR-T cell program in Norway. He has broad clinical research cooperation within NOPHO and EBMT, and cooperates on the development of a TCR T-cell therapy in ALL.
Christian Chabannon
Marseille, France
Institut Paoli-Calmettes
Christian Chabannon
Christian Chabannon is board certified in Oncohematology and in Medical Oncology in France. After training at Lyon University School of Medecine as a graduate student, then at Grenoble University School of Medicine as a resident, he was an Assistant Professor of hematology at Grenoble University School of Medicine and at Grenoble University Hospital. Christian Chabannon completed his training with the preparation of a PhD in cell biology at Grenoble University, and two years as a research associate at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Clinical Research Division, Transplantation Biology program, in Seattle, WA, USA. He then moved to the Institut Paoli-Calmettes Comprehensive Cancer Centre in Marseille, France where he is a full member. For close to 20 years, he heads and is the Qualified Person for the Centre de Thérapie Cellulaire that associates the Cell Collection Facility and the Cell Processing Facility. The two facilities serve the needs of the adult hematopoietic cellular therapy and transplant program at Institut Paoli-Calmettes, of the pediatric hematopoietic cellular therapy and transplant program at Marseille University Hospital, as well as the adult autologous hematopoietic cell transplant programs at several neighboring general hospitals. Christian Chabannon coordinated the efforts to prepare the onboarding of Institut Paoli-Calmettes for the delivery of approved CAR-T Cells following the first wave of approval in Europe.
Christian Chabannon is a Professor of Medicine in Cell Biology at Aix-Marseille Université School of Medicine, where he is specifically involved in training medical and scientific students in the field of therapeutic innovations, with a focus on cell- and tissue-based therapies. He is the medical coordinator for the “Centre d’Investigations Cliniques en Biothérapies de Marseille”, Inserm CBHT 1409 / AMU / AP-HM / IPC.
Christian Chabannon is active in several professional associations and particularly at the European society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation (EBMT). He is the current Chair of The EBMT Cellular Therapy & Immunobiology Working Party (CTIWP), and has been the Chair of the JACIE Accreditation Committee in the past. As CTIWP Chair, he has been greatly involved in the design and implementation of the Cellular Therapy Form that allows for the registration and capture of follow-up of CAR-T Cells treated patient in the EBMT registry, the initiation of Post-Authorization Safety Studies (PASS) in partnership with EMA and with several pharma companies that develop and market CAR-T Cells, and the building of the GoCART Consortium. Christian Chabannon – together with colleagues from EBMT and the EHA, initiated in 2019 the series of annual EU CAR-T Cells Meetings that have immediately met great success, as well as several other educational initiatives dedicated to the rising field of Immune Effector Cells (IEC) therapies.
Hermann Einsele
Wurzburg, Germany
University Hospital Würzburg
Hermann Einsele
Hermann Einsele, MD, FRCP, is Full Professor of Internal Medicine and has been Director of the Department of Internal Medicine II of the University Hospital Würzburg, Germany, since 2004.
Following his medical training at the Universities of Tübingen, Manchester, and London, Professor Einsele became a research fellow in the Department of Haematology, Oncology, Rheumatology, and Immunology at the University of Tübingen, Germany. He was board certified in Internal Medicine in 1991 and in Haematology/Oncology in 1996. In 1999 was promoted as an Associate Professor.
2011-2015 Hermann Einsele was Vice Dean of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Würzburg, 2015 -2021 he was Vice President of the University of Würzburg and since 2020 Chair of the German Society of Hematology and Medical Oncology (DGHO).
In 2003, he received the van Bekkum Award, the highest Annual European award for research in the field of stem cell transplantation. In 2011, he was elected as an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Pathologists (London) and in 2012 Nobel Lecturer Stem Cell Biology/ Transplantation, Nobel Forum Karolinska Institute. Since 2014, he was elected as a member of the Academy of Sciences and Literature, Mainz and 2017/2018/2019/2020 as an ISI “Highly Cited Researcher” in the category Clinical Medicine.
Prof. Einsele is expert in the field of multiple myeloma, stem cell transplantation, CAR T cells, bi-specific antibodies and adoptive immunotherapy.
Sara Ghorashian
London, UK
Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children
Sara Ghorashian
Sara Ghorashian is Consultant Paediatric Haematologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, London, UK. After receiving her medical degree from the University of Oxford, Dr Ghorashian undertook a PhD in TCR gene engineering of therapeutic T cells at the University College London Institute of Immunity and Infection. In 2014 she became Principal Clinical Research Associate at the UCL Institute of Child Health, acting as lead scientist of the CARPALL study, utilising low-avidity CD19 CAR-T cells for therapy of paediatric ALL. This novel CAR T cell product showed equivalent efficacy to Kymriah, with favourable toxicity profile and improved persistence. The study was published in Nature Medicine, 2019 and the CAR developed is now licensed to Autolus Ltd and is the subject of a licensing study in adults.
Dr Ghorashian’s research focuses on T-cell immunobiology and the use of CAR immunotherapies for AML and ALL. She is an investigator on several CAR T cell studies for paediatric ALL, UK lead PI for the BIANCA study of Kymriah in paediatric B cell Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma and UK lead PI for the INCAR consortium which seeks to improve outcomes for patients treated with CAR T cell therapy. She is chair of the Cellular Therapy Working Group of the BSBMTCT and of the UK National CAR T Advisory Panel for ALL.
John Gribben
London, UK
European Hematology Association
Barts Cancer Institute
Queen Mary University of London
John Gribben
Professor John Gribben, MD, DSc, leads the Centre for Haemato-Oncology at Barts Cancer Institute at Queen Mary, University of London, UK, where he holds the Gordon Hamilton Fairley Chair of Medical Oncology. He is an honorary consultant in haemato-oncology and director of the Stem Cell Transplantation Program at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, Barts Health NHS Trust. He completed his doctoral studies at University College London as the recipient of a Wellcome Trust Fellowship and continued his postdoctoral training in medical oncology and then joined the Faculty at the Dana-Farber Cancer, Harvard Medical School, Boston Massachusetts, USA from 1989 to 2015.
He is an author of more than 500 articles and chapters in peer-reviewed publications. He was awarded the Binet-Rai medal in 2017 from the international workshop for CLL (iwCLL) for his pioneering research in CLL He served as an Editor of Blood from 2007 to 2014 . He is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, and the Royal College of Pathologists. He was elected as a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and as a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Science. He is Chair of the international workshop on non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (iwNHL) and Co-Chair of the international workshop for CAR-T cells (iwCART). He serves on the Executive Board and was President of the European Hematology Association from 2019-2021.
Ana Hidalgo-Simon
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
European Medicines Agency
Ana Hidalgo-Simon
Dr Hidalgo-Simon is currently head of Advanced Therapies in the European Medicines Agency (EMA). Previous positions include the head of the Specialised Scientific Disciplines Department, head of Signal Detection, and head of Risk Management, also at EMA. She has a degree in Medicine and Surgery from the University of the Basque Country, Spain, and a PhD from the University of London, UK. Additional qualifications include Health Economics (University of York) and Computing (University of Westminster).
Michael Hudecek
Wurzburg, Germany
University Hospital Würzburg
Michael Hudecek
Michael Hudecek performed medical training at the University of Leipzig, Germany, where he also commenced his specialist training in hematology and oncology. In 2007, Michael joined the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle as a post-doctoral research fellow, where he trained in the laboratory of Prof. Stanley R. Riddell and worked on identifying and validating novel tumor antigens in hematologic malignancies, the design and functional optimization of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) constructs, as well as defining optimal cellular compositions of CAR T-cell products. In 2012, Michael was recruited to the Universitätsklinikum Würzburg, Germany, where he established a translational research program on CAR T-cell immunotherapy. At present, this program comprises physicians, scientists, doctoral students, master students and technicians in a multidisciplinary, international team that performs cutting-edge research with focus on novel transformative CAR technologies, and first-in-man clinical application of novel CAR-T products. Michael is an extraordinary member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences, and recipient of the 2017 Artur Pappenheim Award of the German Society for Hematology and Medical Oncology.
Martin Hutchings
Copenhagen, Denmark
Copenhagen University Hospital
Martin Hutchings
Dr Martin Hutchings is a haemato-oncologist and a senior consultant from the Department of Haematology, Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen University Hospital. He is responsible for lymphoma treatment and clinical research and leads Denmark’s only dedicated Phase 1 unit for experimental treatment of haematological malignancies.
After obtaining his medical degree and master’s degree (2000), he trained in nuclear medicine until pursuing his current specialisation in clinical oncology. In 2006, he defended his PhD on PET/CT in Hodgkin lymphoma.
Dr Hutchings is an active member of the EORTC Lymphoma Group, and chaired the group from 2013 until 2017. He leads a number of clinical and translational studies in the field of lymphoma, with an emphasis on phase 1 haematology studies and on phase 2 and 3 Hodgkin lymphoma and mantle cell lymphoma, while maintaining a special scientific interest in the role of molecular imaging of malignant lymphoma. He has written numerous journal articles and book chapters and acts as an active research supervisor.
Carl June
Philadelphia, USA
University of Pennsylvania
Carl June
Dr. June is the Richard W. Vague Professor in Immunotherapy in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and is currently Director of the Center for Cellular Immunotherapies at the Perelman School of Medicine, and Director of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. June studies mechanisms of lymphocyte activation that relate to immune tolerance and adoptive immunotherapy for cancer and chronic infection. In 2011, his research team published findings detailing a new therapy in which patients with refractory and relapsed chronic lymphocytic leukemia were treated with genetically engineered versions of their own T cells, CAR-Ts. The treatment has also now been used with promising results to treat children with refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia. His work led to the development and commercialization of tisagenlecleucel, the first FDA-approved gene therapy. He has published more than 500 manuscripts and is the recipient of numerous prizes and honors, including election to the Institute of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society and the National Academy of Sciences, the William B Coley award, the Richard V Smalley Memorial Award from the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer, the AACR-CRI Lloyd J. Old Award in Cancer Immunology, the Philadelphia Award, the Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize, the Sanford Lorraine Cross Award and Dan David Prize, the Karl Landsteiner Memorial award, and a lifetime achievement award from the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. June received his Bachelor of Science in Biology from the United States Naval Academy and his M.D. from Baylor College of Medicine. He is board certified in Internal Medicine and Medical Oncology.
Ulrike Köhl
Leipzig, Germany
Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology (IZI)
University and University Hospital of Leipzig
Hannover Medical School (MHH)
Ulrike Köhl
Ulrike Köhl is a full Professor for Immune Oncology at the University of Leipzig, Germany and the director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology since 2017 and holds the position of a full Professor and director of the Institute of Cellular Therapeutics at Hannover Medical School since 2012, respectively.
She has studied both, medicine and biology, worked previously at the MD Anderson Cancer Centre in Houston, USA and at the University Hospital, Frankfurt, Germany. She is an international leading expert in the development and manufacturing of cell and gene therapies in cancer and regenerative medicine and collaborates with both international industry and academic partners. She has a specific own research focus on primary human NK cells as well as chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) expressing T and NK effector cells. The Köhl team has been responsible for one of the first NK cell trial in Europe. Currently, she is heading SaxoCell, a cluster for cell and gene therapy, funded by the Germany federal government as a future and excellence initiative. In addition, she is leading two EU consortia (Mature-NK and ImSavar), is member of numerous national and international societies and is serving as a reviewer for the authorities including PEI and EMA, respectively.
Franco Locatelli
Rome, Italy
IRCCS Ospedale Pediatrico Bambino Gesù
Franco Locatelli
Franco Locatelli is the Head of the Department of Paediatric Haematology and Oncology, IRCCS Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital, Rome and Full Professor of Pediatrics at the Sapienza, University of Rome, Italy. He leads the largest programme of childhood allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) in Italy and in 2019 was appointed President of the Italian Higher Council of Health, the technical scientific advisory body to the Ministry of Health.
Professor Locatelli is an expert in haematological and oncological malignancies of childhood. He has been the President of the Italian Association for Pediatric Hematology-Oncology AIEOP from
2004–2006, and served as chairman of the EWOG-MDS consortium from 2005 to 2011. Currently, he coordinates the national protocols for children with newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukaemia and relapsed acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL). He has implemented in Italy the first-in-human academic studies on children with CD19+ lymphoid malignancies using 2nd-generation retroviral chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells and on children with GD2+ neuroblastoma.
Professor Locatelli is also involved in the development and validation of gene therapy and genome editing approaches in patients with thalassaemia and sickle cell disease and he has extensive experience in running Phase I/II clinical trials. He is the author or co-author of 1.150 peer-reviewed articles published in international journals and he has an overall impact factor above 6000 and an H-index of 105 (Scopus source).
Paul Maciocia
London, UK
University College London IRIS
Paul Maciocia
Dr Maciocia is a Cancer Research UK Clinician Scientist Fellow in Haematology at University College London and honorary consultant haematologist at University College London Hospital. He undertook his undergraduate training in medicine and pharmacology at the University in Edinburgh, and postgraduate training in medicine/ haematology in Edinburgh, Bristol and London. His PhD was based in the laboratory of Dr Martin Pule at University College London, where he developed a novel approach to the diagnosis and treatment of mature T cell malignancies. His current work is in CAR-T for T cell malignancies, development of allogeneic ‘off the shelf’ CAR-T cells, and genetic engineering approaches to enhance the efficacy and safety of these therapies.
Sham Mailankody
New York, USA
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Sham Mailankody
Sham Mailankody is an assistant attending physician at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and an assistant professor of Medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College. My clinical focus is in proving care for patients with multiple myeloma and related disorders. My research focuses on the clinical and translational studies of novel therapies for patients with multiple myeloma and particularly the clinical development of cellular therapies.
Robbie Majzner
Stanford, USA
Stanford University
Robbie Majzner
Robbie Majzner is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Hematology, Oncology, Stem Cell Transplantation & Regenerative Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine. After graduating with a BA from Columbia University, Dr. Majzner attended Harvard Medical School, where he developed an interest in pediatric oncology. He completed his residency training in pediatrics at New York Presbyterian-Columbia and fellowship training in pediatric hematology-oncology at Johns Hopkins and the National Cancer Institute. During his fellowship at the NCI and a subsequent instructorship at Stanford, he became interested in developing new methods to harness the pediatric immune system to target childhood cancer which is now the broad focus of his laboratory group.
Maria Victoria Mateos
Salamanca, Spain
University Hospital of Salamanca, IBSAL
Maria Victoria Mateos
Dr. María-Victoria Mateos, MD, PhD, is Consultant Physician in the Haematology Department and Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Salamanca, Spain. She is the director of the Myeloma Program and coordinates the Clinical Trials Unit in Salamanca’s University Hospital Haematology Department.
She serves as coordinator of GEM (Spanish Myeloma Group), with direct involvement in the design and development of clinical trials. She has coordinated many clinical trials especially in the smouldering myeloma setting and these trials have profoundly influenced current options for the management of these patient populations.
She has published over 250 original papers in international journals and her articles had received 29.452 citations (19268 since 2015) with a H index of 79 and 60 since 2015.
She is also a member of the IMWG (International MM Working Group), IMS (International MM Society), EHA and ASH. Among her invited presentations, she has contributed to the educational sessions of EHA 2012, ASH 2013, ASCO 2015, EHA 2016, ASCO and ASH 2017.
She has served on the ASH Scientific Committee on plasma cell diseases between 2015-2019 and on the EHA’s Scientific Program Committee and Advisory Board since 2013 until 2020 being chair of the Scientific Program Committee in 2019.
She has been Councillor on the EHA Board since 2015 for a four-year mandate, member of the Steering Committee for the Society of Hematologic Oncology (SOHO), member of the IMS board and member of the European School of Haematology (ESH) Scientific committee. She received the Briand Durie Award in 2019 recognizing excellence in myeloma research.
Emanuele Ostuni
Basel, Switzerland
Europe, Cell and Gene Therapy
Novartis Oncology
Emanuele Ostuni
Emanuele is Head of Europe for Cell and Gene Therapies at Novartis Oncology, where he oversees all commercialization aspects of this portfolio in Europe, including Kymriah. With his team, he focuses on expanding access for this one-time therapy across Europe – they have innovated business and reimbursement models and executed them since September 2017.
Emanuele is with Novartis since 2012. He was with Sandoz in the Global Strategy Team, then the Head of Specialty and Hospital Franchises in Central/Eastern Europe, and later as Business Unit Head, Rx in Romania.
Prior to joining Novartis in Europe he was based in the USA where he was Vice President of Business Development at Nano Terra, Engagement Manager at McKinsey & Co and a Senior Research Investigator at Surface Logix. Emanuele was also the co-founder of Enumeral Biomedical and served on its BOD through its public listing in 2014. He currently serves on the Scientific Advisory Board of Anixa Biosciences.
Emanuele holds a PhD in Physical Chemistry from Harvard University and BS and MS degrees in chemistry from Georgetown University.
Ananda Plate
Brussels, Belgium
Myeloma Patients Europe
Ananda Plate
Ananda is Chief Executive Officer at MPE since 2013. She holds a law degree from the University of Barcelona and a master’s degree in Health Policy, Planning and Financing from the London School of Economics and Political Science and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Her main field of interest is cross border healthcare within the EU and health data protection.
She started getting involved in patient advocacy in 2007. Since then, she has collaborated with a number of patient organisations across Europe. She has worked at the leading Institute of Public Law (IDP Barcelona) and the European Commission (DG Health and Consumers). She is also a member of the Ethics Committee at the Chamber of Physicians of Bavaria, Germany, and has been also Chair and Vice-chair of the Workgroup of European Cancer Patient Advocacy Networks (WECAN).
Concetta Quintarelli
Rome, Italy
IRCCS Ospedale Pediatrico Bambino Gesù
Concetta Quintarelli
Prof. Quintarelli is Head of the Gene Therapy Research Unit at the Bambino Gesù Children Hospital in Rome, Italy, and Associate Professor at the Federico II University of Naples in Hematology.
She is currently the Head of the Italian Cancer network for the Immunotherapy working group, a special program for CAR T cell development at the Accademic level. She is involved in several translational projects concerning the adoptive therapy of CAR T cells and TCR for patients with cancer, including sarcoma, neuroblastoma, medulloblastomas and glioblastomas. Furthermore, she has a significant experience in the clinical translation of ATMP developed in the Academic setting, since prof. Quintarelli is also involved in the Hospital GMP Facility approved for the production of CAR T cells for patients. Finally, Prof. Quintarelli is responsible for the Phase I Unit of immunomonitoring patients after receiving the CAR T cell infusion, and she has been recently appointed at EMA-CAT as Italian Rapporteur.
Gilles Salles
New York, USA
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Gilles Salles
Gilles Salles, MD, PhD, has been recently appointed as the Chief of the Lymphoma Service at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, US. He has previously held a position of professor of hematology and medicine at the University of Lyon, and head of the Department of Hematology at the Hospices Civils de Lyon, Centre Hospitalier Lyon-Sud, in Pierre-Bénite, France.
Professor Salles obtained his doctoral degree in differentiation, genetics, and immunology, as well as his medical degree, from Université Claude Bernard Lyon-1. He completed further training in Oncology and also served as a researcher at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute of Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
During his career, Professor Salles has been especially interested in the clinical and biological study of Lymphoma. The primary focus of his work is on the description and validation of prognostic factors and clinical trials in indolent Lymphomas. He also examined several aspects of Lymphoma biology; T- Cell and B-cell Lymphoma models, signaling, genomic biology of indolent Lymphomas, and prognostic factors with his team.
Professor Salles has been involved in the investigation and development of new therapeutic agents, such as targeted therapies, new monoclonal antibodies and other immunotherapies in the field. He led large international studies evaluating treatment options in patients with follicular lymphoma.
Previously, Professor Salles chaired the Lymphoma Study Association, a European cooperative group. He is also a member of several international societies, including the American Society of Hematology.
Professor Salles is the author of more than 300 publications, including articles in international peer-reviewed journals such as The New England Journal of Medicine, Blood, Journal of Clinical Oncology, The Lancet, Haematologica, Lancet Oncology, and Leukemia and Lymphoma.
Peter Schellongowski
Vienna, Austria
Medical University of Vienna, Vienna General Hospital
Peter Schellongowski
Peter Schellongowski is a medical intensive care specialist and associate professor at the Department of Medicine I, Medical University of Vienna. His clinical and scientific main emphasis is the care of critically immunosuppressed patients as well the management of the acute respiratory failure including extracorporeal life support techniques. He is involved in several international networks on the care of immunosuppressed patients, leads and participates in several investigations matching with his focus of interest, and serves as officer in several scientific societies.
Stephan Schuster
Philadelphia, USA
University of Pennsylvania
Stephan Schuster
Stephen J. Schuster, MD is the Robert and Margarita Louis-Dreyfus Professor of CLL and Lymphoma and a professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He is also the Director of the Lymphoma Program and Director of Lymphoma Translational Research at the Abramson Cancer Center.
After graduating AOA from Jefferson Medical College and completing his residency at Pennsylvania Hospital, Dr. Schuster completed clinical and research fellowships at the Cardeza Foundation for Hematologic Research. In 1989, he became a member of the Cardeza Foundation at Jefferson Medical College.
Dr. Schuster joined the University of Pennsylvania in 1998. Since then, his research has focused on the development and application of novel immunotherapies for B-cell lymphomas and CLL, including autologous tumor-derived vaccines, autologous co-stimulated T-cells, radioimmunotherapy, monoclonal antibody therapy, bi-specific antibody therapy, and adoptive immunotherapy using chimeric antigen receptor modified T cells (CAR-T cells)
He has over 300 publications and has received numerous awards for outstanding teaching and research.
Marion Subklewe
Munich, Germany
Ludwig Maximilians University Hospital
Marion Subklewe
Marion Subklewe is Head of the Laboratory for Translational Cancer Immunotherapy at the Gene Center, Munich and Professor of Internal Medicine at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany. She studied medicine at University Hospital Tübingen and completed her postdoctoral fellowship at Rockefeller University in New York.
Professor Subklewe is current Head of the Immunotherapy Program in Haematology and the CAR T Program at University Hospital Munich, Founder and Speaker of the national “Harmonize MRD Flow” Consortium and member of the ELN Working group on MRD. She is also active in clinical research and has been Principal Investigator in 3 I-IT trials in AML and ALL, as well as in over 30 oligo- and multicentric Phase I trials in leukaemia and lymphoma. In recognition of her work, Professor Subklewe has received numerous honours and awards including the EHA Educational Presentation and ASH Abstract Achievement Awards.
Catherine Thieblemont
Paris, France
Saint Louis Hospital
Catherine Thieblemont
Catherine Thieblemont, MD, is Professor of Haematology at Paris University and Head of the Haemato-Oncology Department at the Hôpital Saint-Louis in Paris, France.
Professor Thieblemont trained as a haemato-oncologist in Lyon, France subsequently spent 2 years at the Department of Hemato-Pathology at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, MD, USA. Since 2007, she is the head of the Hemato-Oncology Department at the Hôpital Saint-Louis, Paris, focusing on the management of patients with lymphoma.
Professor Thieblemont’s major research interests are the biological and clinical features of lymphomas. Professor Thieblemont is currently involved in many clinical of lymphoma treatment, particularly innovative treatments including targeted therapies, immunotherapies, and chimeric antigen receptor T cell (CAR T cell) therapy. Professor Thieblemont participates in translational research programmes developing genomic and metabolomic studies on low- and high-grade lymphomas, predominantly marginal zone lymphomas (MZL) and refractory aggressive B-cell lymphomas, using integrative genomics and metobolomics to determine key biological targets for new therapies.
Professor Thieblemont is an active member of the Lymphoma Study Association (LYSA), as a member of both the Steering Committee and the Scientific Committee, and is the coordinator of the MZL Subcommittee. She also serves on the Board of Directors of the International Extranodal Lymphoma Study Group (IELSG).
Cameron Turtle
Seattle, USA
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
University of Washington
Cameron Turtle
Dr. Turtle is a Professor and the Anderson Family Endowed Chair for Immunotherapy at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (FHCRC) and Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington (UW). He serves as an attending physician at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance (SCCA) and the UW Medical Center, and has a research laboratory in the Clinical Research Division at FHCRC. His laboratory is focused on understanding the characteristics of human T cells, their potential utility for tumor immunotherapy, and their role in immune reconstitution after hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.
Carin Uyl-de Groot
Rotterdam, The Netherlands
Erasmus University Rotterdam
Institute for Medical Technology Assessment (iMTA)
Carin Uyl-de Groot
Carin Uyl-de Groot (1966) is Professor of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) at the Erasmus University Rotterdam, the Netherlands. She is head of the HTA section of the Erasmus School of Health Policy&Management and director of the institute for Medical Technology Assessment (iMTA b.v.). Her research activities are mainly focused on cost-effectiveness and outcomes studies in cancer. In 2018, she was chair of the public health and health economics track of the ESMO 2018 conference. Her papers in Nature Reviews (2018) about a new pricing model for (cancer) drugs and in Cancers (2020) about access to new cancer drugs across Europe, have attracted a lot of attention.