Patrick S.F. Bellgowan, PhD

Program Director, Repair & Plasticity
National Institute for Neurological Diseases & Stroke

Dr. Patrick S.F. Bellgowan received his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee where he studied fear conditioning in rodents. He then did neuroimaging-focused postdoctoral fellowships at the Medical College of Wisconsin and at NIMH’s Intramural Research Program. The research focus of these fellowships was on memory function in healthy controls and in epilepsy patients. Following his fellowship training, Dr. Bellgowan joined NIMH’s Intramural Research Program as a Staff Scientist in the Laboratory of Brain and Cognition. Dr. Bellgowan left NIMH to join the development of a new neuroimaging-based psychiatric research institute in Oklahoma. He comes to NINDS from the Laureate Institute for Brain Research in Tulsa, OK where he served as Associate Professor and Director of Cognitive Research. While at the Laureate Institute, Dr. Bellgowan developed multiple competitively funded projects. His main research program focused on understanding the neurological and psychiatric sequelae of sports-related concussion using magnetic resonance neuroimaging and blood-based immunological markers.

Lisa Brenner, PhD, ABPP

Director
VA Rocky Mountain Mental Illness Research Education and Clinical Center (MIRECC)

Lisa A. Brenner, Ph.D., is a Board-Certified Rehabilitation Psychologist, a Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (PM&R), Psychiatry, and Neurology at the University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus, and the Director of the Department of Veterans Affairs Rocky Mountain Mental Illness Research, Education, and Clinical Center (MIRECC). She is also Vice Chair of Research for the Department of PM&R. Dr. Brenner is a Past President of Division 22 (Rehabilitation Psychology) of the American Psychological Association (APA) and an APA Fellow. She serves as an Associate Editor of the Journal of Head Trauma Rehabilitation. Her primary area of research interest is traumatic brain injury, co-morbid psychiatric disorders, and negative psychiatric outcomes, including suicide. Dr. Brenner has over 200 peer-reviewed publications, participates on national advisory boards, and has recently co-authored a book titled: Suicide Prevention After Neurodisability: An Evidence-Informed Approach.

David Brody, MD, PhD

Director
Center for Neuroscience and Regenerative Medicine, The USU/NIH Traumatic Brain Injury Research Group

David L. Brody, MD, PhD, is the Director of the Center for Neuroscience and Regenerative Medicine (CNRM) and a Professor of Neurology within the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USU) in Bethesda, Maryland. He is a board-certified neurologist with both a research and a clinical specialization in traumatic brain injury (TBI) and neurodegenerative diseases. His research focuses on accelerating better outcomes for U.S. military TBI patients.

Prior to his current position, Dr. Brody was the Norman J. Stupp Professor of Neurology at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri. Dr. Brody was also the Washington University site director for the National Football League’s Neurological Care Foundation.

He has developed and authenticated advanced imaging technologies to detect injury in the brain’s white matter and showed, for the first time, how to predict neurological function by measuring amyloid, an abnormal protein in the brain. He also helped discover that diffusion tensor imaging, an advanced magnetic resonance imaging technique, can reveal blast-related damage.

Dr. Brody previously led a team that worked in partnership with U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) researchers at the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany and at two sites in Afghanistan, treating U.S. military personnel with TBIs. In 2011, he served as a consultant to the medical advisor of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He traveled to Afghanistan at the request of then-JCS Admiral Michael Mullen with the “Gray Team”, a group of civilian and military experts evaluating the status of TBIs in troops within the combat zone.

His achievements have been recognized with several awards, including a Career Development Award from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, and a Burroughs Wellcome Career Award in the Biomedical Sciences. Dr. Brody is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Neurotrauma and Acta Neuropathologica and a permanent member of the National Institute of Health Acute Neural Injury and Epilepsy Study Section. His clinical monograph entitled “Concussion Care Manual: A Practical Guide” was published by Oxford University Press in 2014.

Dr. Brody earned a B.A. in Biological Sciences from Stanford University and his MD and PhD from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He completed his neurology residency at the Washington University in St. Louis.

Thomas DeGraba, MD

Chief Innovations Officer
National Intrepid Center of Excellence (NICoE), Walter Reed National Military Medical Center

David Cifu, MD

Associate Dean of Innovation and System Integration
Herman J. Flax, MD Professor and Chair, Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation
Virgina Commonwealth University

Senior TBI Specialist
U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

Principal Investigator, Chronic Effects of Neurotrauma Consortium
U.S. Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs

David Cifu, MD is the Associate Dean for Innovation and System Integration in the Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) School of Medicine, and the Chairman and Herman J. Flax, MD Endowed Professor (tenured) of the Department of PM&R at VCU-School of Medicine in Richmond, Virginia. He is also Chief of PM&R Services for the VCU Health System and Founding Director of the VCU-Center for Rehabilitation Sciences and Engineering (CERSE). He is the Senior TBI Specialist for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. He has been funded on 45 research grants for over $190 million, including currently serving as Principal Investigator of the VA/DoD $62.2 million Chronic Effects of Neurotrauma Consortium (CENC). In his more than 25 years as an academic physiatrist, he has delivered more than 560 regional, national and international lectures, published more than 225 scientific articles and 65 abstracts, and co-authored or edited 35 books and book chapters. He is the Past President of the American Academy of PM&R (2007-8), Editor-in-Chief of the 5th Edition of Braddom’s Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation textbook (2015), co-Editor of Braddom’s Handbook of Rehabilitation Medicine (2017), and Editor-in-Chief of the upcoming 6th Edition of Braddom’s Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation textbook (2020)

Fiona Crawford, PhD

President & CEO
Roskamp Institute

Dr. Crawford has 20 years of experience in the field of research and development for Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders. Throughout her career, Dr. Crawford has received and managed numerous grants and contracts for neuroscience research.

Kristophe Diaz, PhD

Senior Manager, Scientific Programs
Cohen Veterans Network

After earning a doctorate in Molecular and Cellular Biology at the University of Massachusetts, Dr. Diaz investigated key mechanisms of cell division. He has also studied Life Science Innovation at Harvard Medical School and Business Law for Entrepreneurs at MIT Sloan School of Management.

Chantelle Ferland-Beckham, PhD

Senior Manager, Scientific Programs
Cohen Veterans Bioscience

Dr. Chantelle Ferland-Beckham is a translational neuroscientist with over 12 years of experience in behavioral models of stress-related psychiatric disorders. The major goal of her research has been to develop animal models to investigate the complex molecular and epigenetic underpinnings of stress-induced pathology, including depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. She earned her PhD in Neuroscience from Tulane University under the mentorship of Dr. Laura Schrader and then went on to complete a postdoctoral fellowship at the Medical University of South Carolina, where she was awarded the Ruth L Kirschstein National Service Award (T32) from the National Institute of Drug Addiction to investigate the role of the endogenous oxytocin system in a model of comorbid methamphetamine addiction and post-traumatic stress disorder. Most recently, Chantelle was a AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow at the National Institutes of Health, where she worked as a Science Policy Analyst, developing policies to promote progress in biomedical research and serving as a legislative analyst to strengthen the relationship between the NIH and Congress. As a fellow, she worked on the Fellows in Innovation initiative, spearheaded by the Obama administration’s Office of Science and Technology Policy, to analyze current strategies and provide policy recommendations for suicide prevention in current and former members of the US military.

Jam Ghajar, MD, PhD, FACS

President
Brain Trauma Foundation

Clinical Professor of Neurosurgery
Stanford University School of Medicine

Jamshid Ghajar MD, PhD, FACS, is a board certified neurosurgeon, Clinical Professor of Neurosurgery, Director of the Stanford Concussion and Brain Performance Center and President of the Brain Trauma Foundation in New York City and Palo Alto.

He completed the MD/PhD program at Cornell University Medical College. During his residency training in neurosurgery at New York Presbyterian Hospital, he invented and patented several neurosurgical devices that are currently used worldwide. After residency, he joined the faculty at the New York Presbyterian Hospital-Cornell Medical Center and was a founder of the Brain Trauma Foundation (BTF) in 1986. The mission of the BTF is to improve the outcome of patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI). He joined the neurosurgery faculty at Stanford in February 2014.

Jessica Gill, PhD, RN, FAAN

Deputy Scientific Director of the Division of Intramural Research

National Institute of Nursing Research

Dr. Jessica Gill’s interest in research began during her nursing undergraduate (B.S.N.) career, during which she volunteered with women and children whose lives were negatively affected by violence. She observed that this extreme stress resulted in differing outcomes with some women being substantially impaired, whereas others were able to recover. She questioned the mechanisms underlying these divergent responses to extreme stress. This line of questioning led her to pursue a graduate degree (M.S.) from Oregon Health and Science University in psychiatric nursing, which included clinical training in the PTSD program at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

Research questions about trauma and resiliency were amplified during her work with Vietnam veterans who remained impacted by their combat service decades after returning home. Based on these volunteer and clinical experiences, she decided to pursue a doctorate at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Nursing. Her dissertation research demonstrated the presence of high rates of PTSD in urban health care seeking women, and that a PTSD diagnosis was associated with perceived health declines as well as with higher concentrations of inflammatory markers and a dysregulation of endocrine functioning.

Following completion of her Ph.D., she obtained a post-doctoral fellowship at the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) to better understand the biological mechanisms of PTSD and depression, finding central and peripheral alterations in the in-vivo functioning of both immune and endocrine systems. This line of research also led her to become a Clinical Investigator in the Center for Neuroscience and Regenerative Medicine (CNRM). She also is involved in leading national biomarker studies in athletes, military personnel and civilians. In these positions, she advises in the design and implementation of biomarker studies to ultimately improve the care of individuals with concussions and TBIs.

Magali Haas, MD, PhD

CEO and President
Cohen Veterans Bioscience

Dr. Haas is Chair, CEO and President of Cohen Veterans Bioscience, a non-profit brain research organization based in New York City whose mission is to fast-track diagnostics and therapeutics to advance precision brain health. Magali has over 15 years of pharmaceutical executive experience, predominantly at Johnson & Johnson, where she assumed broad end-to-end development leadership roles in early & late stage neuroscience clinical development, translational medicine, diagnostics and integrative solutions. To pioneer new approaches for precision therapeutics for brain health, she founded Orion Bionetworks in 2012, which was transformed to Cohen Veterans Bioscience in 2015, while also serving as founding Chief Science and Technology Officer for One Mind for Research. She serves on several advisory boards including Alto Neurosciences, Partnership for Assessment and Accreditation of Scientific Practice, VirtualBrainCloud, Krembil Centre for Neuroinformatics and IMEC for nanoelectronics.  Magali earned her BS in bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania, an MS in biomedical engineering from Rutgers University, and her MD and PhD in neuroscience with distinction from Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

Nicole Harmon, PhD

Executive Director, Community Partnerships
Cohen Veterans Bioscience

Nicole Harmon brings more than 18 years of experience in psychology, philanthropy, patient advocacy, public health, and clinical research, most recently as the Chief Operating Officer and Chief of Staff for Clinical Data Interchange Standards Consortium (CDISC), FDA’s partner for data standards. During her tenure there she transformed CDISC’s financial roadmaps, program management and global brand. Additionally, she developed and managed complex partnerships with leading U.S and International funding partners, U.S. FDA, Japan PMDA, European Medicines Agency, NIH, WHO, EU’s Innovative Medicines Initiatives, Global Patient Foundations and others to drive data standards and sharing initiatives and oversaw grants cultivation and management successfully achieving funding for and administering multiple large-scale projects.  Prior to her time with CDISC, Dr. Harmon evaluated patients with Traumatic Brain Injury and Psychiatric conditions in a post-acute rehabilitation hospital.

Nicole earned her doctorate in Counselor Education and Supervision at Texas Tech University with dissertation focus on understanding the caregivers experience associated with acquired brain injury following discharge from rehabilitation.

Nicole joins CVB to oversee development and engagement of strategic partnerships, grant management, events and the Brain Trauma Blueprint to further the CVB mission.    

Ronald L. Hayes, PhD

Founder and Chief Science Officer
Banyan Biomarkers

Dr. Hayes has 40 years of research experience in brain injury.  For more than 15 years his interests have focused on development of biochemical markers of acute CNS injury including traumatic brain injury (TBI) detectable in blood. During his academic career, Dr. Hayes has published more than 320 peer reviewed publications, 58 book chapters and edited six books or journal special editions. In 2002, he co-founded Banyan Biomarkers, Inc. In 2018, Banyan produced the  first  FDA approved blood biomarker test for diagnosis of brain injury.

Michael Hoffman

Deputy Director, Division of Neurological and Physical Medicine Devices
U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)

Michael has worked at FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health (CDRH), Office of Device Evaluation (ODE) since 2007 in the area of neurological devices including various forms of neurostimulation, neurodiagnostics, and rehabilitation as well as BCI devices, providing review of several different types of medical devices before they are marketed and before many are studied in clinical trials. He began his current role as Deputy Director of the Division of Neurological and Physical Medicine Devices in CDRH/ODE in 2015, which includes oversight of these premarket activities for a wide variety of devices associated with neurology and rehabilitation including but not limited to prosthetic limbs, brain-computer interface systems, rehabilitation robotics, powered exoskeletons, neurosurgical tools, stereotaxic systems, neurodiagnostic systems, and neurointerventional devices as well as a wide variety of implanted and external neurostimulation systems. Michael received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign and his M.S. in Biomedical Engineering from Marquette University.

Stuart Hoffman, PhD

Scientific Program Manager for Brain Health & Injury
U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

Dr. Hoffman is the point of contact for VA/ORD on traumatic brain injury research. In this role, Dr. Hoffman has oversight for two VA TBI Research Centers and is the Co-chair of the Government Steering Committee for the VA/DoD Chronic Effects of Neurotrauma Consortium, as well as a the VA TBI subject matter expert for the National Research Action Plan for Improving Access to Mental Health Services for Veterans, Service Members, and Military Families. Dr. Hoffman also serves on several intra- and interagency advisory committees for VA and DoD, including the Congressionally-mandated Traumatic Brain injury Advisory Committee for the Veterans Health Administration. In addition, Dr. Hoffman is the VA representative on the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine’s Forum on Neuroscience and Nervous System Disorders.

Dr. Hoffman received his doctoral degree in behavioral and molecular neuroscience at Rutgers University in 1995 and completed his postdoctoral training in pharmacology at Virginia Commonwealth University in 1997. Dr. Hoffman’s professional career began at Emory University as a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurology in 1998 and was an Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine from 2000 to 2006. Immediately prior to joining the VA in 2010, Dr. Hoffman was the Research Director for the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. Dr. Hoffman has more than 30 years of translational neuroscience research experience and intellectual property development that focused on neuroprotection and methods to promote recovery of function after brain injury.

Grant Iverson, PhD

Director, Neuropsychology Outcome Assessment Laboratory, Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation
Harvard Medical School, and Spaulding Rehabilitation Network

Dr. Grant Iverson is a specialist in neuropsychology and a clinician scientist in the area of mild traumatic brain injury and mental health. He has an internationally-recognized research program in outcome from mild traumatic brain injury in athletes, civilians, military service members, and veterans. He served as the Chair for the Canadian Psychological Association Section on Clinical Neuropsychology from 2003-2010. He is a member of the Board of Governors of the International Brain Injury Association (2012-2015). He served as a consensus panel member for the 3rd and 4th International Conferences on Concussion in Sport in Zurich, Switzerland in 2008 and 2012, and the 5th International Conference in Berlin in 2016. He served as an Advisor to the Neurocognitive Disorders Workgroup (Traumatic Brain Injury) for the Diagnostic & Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th Edition (DSM-V). He also served as a founding member of the Traumatic Brain Injury Subcommittee of the Defense Health Board, a civilian advisory board to the United States Secretary of Defense. He was the President of the National Academy of Neuropsychology in 2015.

William S. Korinek, PhD

CEO
Astrocyte Pharmaceuticals

Dr. Korinek is Astrocyte Pharmaceuticals’ CEO and Co-Founded the company in 2014. Previously, he was at Pfizer for almost 10 years in a number of strategic and operational R&D positions, most recently serving as the Vice President of Worldwide R&D Business Operations. Dr. Korinek and his organization managed the Worldwide R&D annual operating plan process, including coordination of annual investment business plans from all of Pfizer’s Research Units and functional Partner Lines and the setting of annual investment and budget targets. He has broad experience from early discovery through full development, small and large therapeutic modalities, and many disease areas. At Pfizer, he championed and secured $24M in capital for a long term Project and Resource Planning productivity program that was successfully implemented over 2011-2014. Dr. Korinek also managed Pfizer’s R&D Program Management Office (PMO) for the Pfizer-Wyeth integration, and the PMO for Pfizer WRD’s 2011 “Engine for Sustainable Innovation” strategic restructuring involving the reduction of Pfizer’s overall R&D 2012 spend from $8.0-8.5B to $6.5-7.0B.

Anthony Kontos, PhD

Assistant Director of Research
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center

Saafan Malik, MD

Director of Research/Acting Deputy Division Chief
Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center

Carlos Peña, PhD

Director
Office of Neurological and Physical Medicine Devices,
(OHT5) Office of Product Evaluation and Quality (OPEQ),
Center for Devices and Radiological Health, FDA

Retsina Meyer, PhD

Manager, Clinical Programs
Cohen Veterans Bioscience

Dr. Retsina Meyer pairs pursuit of scientific endeavors with the passionate execution to make real her vision to develop cures for mental illness.

Dr. Meyer is a translational neuroscientist, scientific founder of Resilience – a startup focused on novel treatments for PTSD and other brain diseases, and is currently consulting Scientific Program Manager for Cohen Biosciences. An active member of the biotech entrepreneurship community, Retsina works on local, national, and international programming to inspire scientist-entrepreneurs. Dr. Meyer has produced over 40 articles, abstracts, and lectures. Her academic discoveries gained international press, earned her a speaking engagement at the local TEDx conference, and served as the instigating discovery to found Resilience.

As an entrepreneur, Retsina is an alumna of MassBIO’s MassCONNECT program and SpringBoard’s Life Sciences Accelerator and is the 2014 champion of the international OneStart competition awarded by GSK’s SR One.
She obtained a Neuroscience Ph.D. at MIT where she earned five named fellowships, was a Presidential Fellow, Imperial College of London Global Fellow, and a Graduate Woman of Excellence. She served as a science advocate with the Science Policy Initiative, performing outreach, giving lectures, and meeting with members of congress to appeal for science and scientific funding.
Prior to her work at MIT, Dr. Meyer was a Fulbright Scholar, serving as a representative of the U.S. to Norway, where she worked in the lab of 2014 Nobel Prize winners Drs. May-Britt Moser and Edvard Moser. She holds bachelor’s degrees in applied mathematics, biochemistry and molecular biophysics, and biopsychology from the University of Arizona where she was a Baver Scholar, and worked in the laboratories of Dr. David Rowe, Dr. Carol Barnes, and Dr. Bruce McNaughton.

Nicole joins CVB to oversee development and engagement of strategic partnerships, grant management, events and the Brain Trauma Blueprint to further the CVB mission.    

Roger Murry

Executive Director
Coalition to Heal Invisible Wounds

Senior Policy Advisor
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld

Roger Murry represents clients before Congress, the administration and outside stakeholders on a variety of public policy issues.

Prior to joining Akin Gump, Roger was managing director at Parven Pomper Strategies (PPS) Inc., representing domestic and international clients on international trade, foreign affairs and health care issues.

He joined PPS after serving as a trade and health care advisor for Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-CA), chair of the New Democrat Coalition and a leader on pro-trade Democratic policy. Roger served as the congresswoman’s point person for international trade, health care reform, financial services and patent reform. He began his Capitol Hill career with Rep. Grace Napolitano (D-CA).

Rachel Ramoni, DMD, ScD

Chief Research and Development Officer
US Department of Veterans Affairs

Dr. Rachel Ramoni leads the approximately $2 billion research program at the US Department of Veterans Affairs, a job she has held since 2017. VA research is embedded within one of the largest integrated healthcare systems in the United States, with active research programs at approximately 100 of the 170 VA medical centers across the country. Rachel often describes this as her dream job, given that her passion is helping large research efforts of any type to achieve impactful, real-world results. This is borne out in the work she did before coming to the VA. For example, she led the team at Harvard Medical School that created SMART-on-FHIR, the data exchange format used by the major electronic health records and Apple HealthKit. Additionally, Rachel established and led the coordinating center for the Undiagnosed Diseases Network, which has the tagline, “solving medical mysteries through team science”. To date, this network of clinicians and researchers has diagnosed over 500 people living with previously mysterious medical conditions. At her current job, Rachel conceived of and is leading the effort to transform VA research from a large number of independently operating sites into an integrated enterprise that can more efficiently deliver on its mission to improve Veterans’ well-being through research.

Uzma Samadani, MD, PhD

Associate Professor, Department of Neurosurgery, Medical School, Neurosurgeon
Minneapolis VA Medical Center

Rockswold Kaplan Endowed Chair for Traumatic Brain Injury Research
HCMC

Uzma Samadani, MD PhD is a neurosurgeon and brain injury researcher at the University of Minnesota.  She moved to Minneapolis in 2015 and was named to Minneapolis St-Paul Magazine’s “Top Doctors in Neurosurgery” lists in 2016 through 2019.  In 2018 she was on the cover of the “Top Doctors” edition with the byline “The Doctor Will Save You Now.”  In 2018 she also was awarded the “Courageous Women in Healthcare” award by the Women’s Health Leadership Trust and named a “Top Doctor in Minnesota”.

Dr. Samadani is an Associate Professor in the Department of Neurosurgery at the University of Minnesota with graduate faculty appointments in Neuroscience and Bioinformatics and Computational Biology.  She is also an attending neurosurgeon at Centracare and the Minneapolis Veterans Administration Medical Center and founder of the neurodiagnostic start-up Oculogica Inc.

She is on the Executive Committee of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons/Congress of Neurological Surgeons Joint Section on Neurotrauma and Critical Care and served as Scientific Program Chair for their meeting in conjunction with the National Neurotrauma Society from 2014-7.  She also serves on the board and is President-Elect of ThinkFirst Foundation, the largest brain injury prevention foundation in the world.  She currently chairs the Minnesota State Traumatic Brain and Spinal Cord Injury Research Program.  She is a Past-President of Women in Neurosurgery.

Dr. Samadani has received more than three million dollars in research grants from national and international competitive funding agencies to study diagnostics, risks, outcomes and treatments for brain injury.  She has been funded by the United States Veterans Administration, National Space and Biomedical Research Institute, Abbott Diagnostic Laboratories, American College of Surgeons, American Association of Neurological Surgeons, Thrasher Research Fund, Integra, the Steven and Alexandra Cohen Foundation and several other organizations.

She is certified by the American Board of Neurological Surgeons and a fellow of the American College of Surgeons and American Association of Neurological Surgeons.  Her research on brain injury has been discussed in the New York Times, LeMonde, LeFigaro, Wired, Washington Post, Sports Illustrated, Forbes, and Minneapolis Star Tribune as well as numerous other media sources.  She has been a speaker at TedMed, the North American Brain Injury Society, National Neurotrauma Society, American Association of Neurological Surgeons meeting and multiple other conferences.  She has published more than 50 peer-reviewed scientific papers and an additional 30 reviews and chapters including in the Journal of Neurotrauma, JAMA Neurology, Journal of Neurosurgery and the New England Journal of Medicine.

Dr. Samadani also serves as an unaffiliated neurotrauma consultant to the National Football League.

Rosina Samadani, PhD

CEO
Oculogica

Dr. Samadani has 20 years of experience with medical device companies, including 7 years with McKinsey & Company as a leader in their healthcare practice. Oculogica is her 4th startup. Dr. Samadani has her BS and MS from MIT in Mechanical Engineering, and her PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Northwestern University.

Douglas Smith, MD

Robert A. Groff Professor Of Teaching And Research In Neurosurgery
Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania

Michael E. Singer, PhD

CEO
BrainScope

Michael Singer has over 25 years of executive leadership with significant operating, healthcare and financial experience. 

As CEO of BrainScope, Michael has guided the company from technology development, clinical studies, product validation, Intellectual Property creation, organizational build, and multiple regulatory clearances to commercial launch of the first FDA-cleared medical device for assessment of the full spectrum of brain injury, including concussion.  Michael also secured significant equity investment and research funding through government and military research contracts.

Before Michael joined BrainScope, he was President of Revolution Health Investments, where he managed its sale to Everyday Health. He was previously the Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President of Corporate Development for Data Critical Corporation, a Seattle-based venture-backed medical device company. At Data Critical he was responsible for facilitating the company’s IPO and eventually led the sale of Data Critical to General Electric (GE). He has also worked as an executive at Microsoft Corporation responsible for developing small business and healthcare strategies.  For a decade Michael was a healthcare investment banker and M&A generalist for Wolfensohn & Co., Alex. Brown and Montgomery Securities in New York and San Francisco. He started his career at Union Bank of Switzerland in Zurich.

Michael has served on the Board of Directors of Exact Sciences Corporation (molecular diagnostics), MedEfficiency (medical devices, sold to Derma Sciences), SparkPeople (consumer health), One Reel (entertainment), Data Critical Corporation (medical devices, sold to GE), and the Advisory Board of the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. He holds a Ph.D. from the London School of Economics.

James Stone, MD, PhD

Vice Chairman of Clinical Research, Associate Professor of Radiology and Medical Imaging
University of Virginia

James R. Stone, MD, PhD is Associate Professor and Vice Chair of Research in the Department of Radiology and Medical Imaging at the University of Virginia. He is a clinical Interventional Radiologist with a neuroscience background. His laboratory currently explores questions related to improving the clinical diagnosis of traumatic brain injury (TBI) in both preclinical models and human subjects. Ongoing preclinical work includes the design and investigation of molecular imaging probes for the detection of acute and chronic effects of TBI. He is involved with work exploring neurovascular changes in a preclinical blast TBI model. Human subjects efforts focus upon exploring neuroimaging correlates of repetitive low-level blast exposure in military populations. The goals of this work include determining whether military service members in this environment are at risk for developing long term neurological sequelae. Additionally, Dr. Stone is involved with efforts to build a normative library to support improved population level research and work towards single subject assessment of patients with TBI. Further, he is involved with work utilizing machine learning/deep learning approaches for the automated segmentation of imaging findings diagnostic of TBI as well as the joint analysis of multi-modal imaging and non-imaging data in a common framework. He is a member of the neuroimaging core laboratory for the Chronic Effects of Neurotrauma Consortium. Dr. Stone collaborates with the Naval Medical Research Center on a number of ongoing projects related to military TBI and subconcussive neurological response to blast exposure. His work receives support from the Defense Health Program through the Military Operational Research Program as well as the Combat Casualty Care Research Program. His work also receives support from the Office of Naval Research and Navy Advanced Medical Development Program Office. His participation on efforts to establish a normative neuroimaging library receives support from Cohen Veterans Bioscience.

Christopher Whitlow, MD, PhD

Professor, Diagnostic Radiology
Wake Forest School of Medicine

Stephen Xenakis, MD

Brigadier General (Ret.)
U.S. Army

Dr. Xenakis is an adult, child, and adolescent psychiatrist with many years of clinical, academic, and management experience. He retired from the U.S. Army in 1998 at the rank of Brigadier General and entered an active career in starting up medical technology companies and clinical practice. He has advised the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other senior Department of Defense officials on psychological health and the effects of blast concussion. BG (Ret) Xenakis has an active clinical and research practice in leveraging technology to improve healthcare services and sustain military readiness.   He serves on the Executive Board of the Center for Ethics and Rule of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, the editorial board of the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and Law, and is an Adjunct Professor at the Uniformed Services of Health Sciences (USUHS) of the military medical department. He is a graduate of Princeton University and the University of Maryland School of Medicine.

Elisabeth Wilde, PhD

Professor,
University of Utah / VA Salt Lake City

Dr. Elisabeth Wilde is a Health Research Scientist in the US Veterans Affairs Health System (VA Salt Lake City Healthcare System), and is a Professor in the Department of Neurology at the University of Utah and an Associate Professor in the Departments of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation  at Baylor College of Medicine. Her research interests include the use of advanced forms of neuroimaging to enhance diagnosis and prognosis, monitor recovery and neurodegeneration, evaluate the efficacy of therapeutic intervention, understand relations with other biomarkers, and elucidate aspects of neuroplasticity in traumatic brain injury. As a clinical neuropsychologist, she has an interest in brain-behavior relationships involving cognitive, neurological, and functional outcome and clinical trials in traumatic brain injury and associated comorbidities. For the last 20 years, she has worked with patients with traumatic brain injury and concussion across a spectrum of age, severity, and acuity, with particular interests in Veteran and Active Duty Service Members, athletes, and children and adolescents, with concussion or traumatic brain injury.  She has participated in over 40 federally-funded clinical projects in TBI, and has authored over 120 peer-reviewed publications. Dr. Wilde is currently the Director of the Neuroimaging Core for the Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs co-funded Chronic Effects of Neurotrauma Consortium (CENC) Neuroimaging Core and has been actively involved in the International Common Data Elements (CDE) initiative and co-leads the Enhancing Neuroimaging Genetics Meta-analysis (ENIGMA) Working Group for TBI.

Kristophe Diaz, PhD

Senior Manager, Scientific Programs
Cohen Veterans Network

After earning a doctorate in Molecular and Cellular Biology at the University of Massachusetts, Dr. Diaz investigated key mechanisms of cell division. He has also studied Life Science Innovation at Harvard Medical School and Business Law for Entrepreneurs at MIT Sloan School of Management.

Chantelle Ferland-Beckham, PhD

Senior Manager, Scientific Programs
Cohen Veterans Bioscience

Dr. Chantelle Ferland-Beckham is a translational neuroscientist with over 12 years of experience in behavioral models of stress-related psychiatric disorders. The major goal of her research has been to develop animal models to investigate the complex molecular and epigenetic underpinnings of stress-induced pathology, including depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. She earned her PhD in Neuroscience from Tulane University under the mentorship of Dr. Laura Schrader and then went on to complete a postdoctoral fellowship at the Medical University of South Carolina, where she was awarded the Ruth L Kirschstein National Service Award (T32) from the National Institute of Drug Addiction to investigate the role of the endogenous oxytocin system in a model of comorbid methamphetamine addiction and post-traumatic stress disorder. Most recently, Chantelle was a AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow at the National Institutes of Health, where she worked as a Science Policy Analyst, developing policies to promote progress in biomedical research and serving as a legislative analyst to strengthen the relationship between the NIH and Congress. As a fellow, she worked on the Fellows in Innovation initiative, spearheaded by the Obama administration’s Office of Science and Technology Policy, to analyze current strategies and provide policy recommendations for suicide prevention in current and former members of the US military.

Noel Gunther

Executive Director
BrainLine

Noel Gunther is Vice President, Learning Media at WETA-TV, the flagship PBS station in Washington, D.C. He also serves as Executive Director of BrainLine.org, the premiere national website about brain injuries and PTSD.

Gunther has broad experience in radio, television, print, and the Internet. He has written and produced award-winning documentaries for NPR and Public Radio International, including: Gray Matters: Depression with Mike Wallace (Gold Award, International Radio Festival of New York); Drugs, Alcohol and the Brain with Pat Summerall (Gold Cindy Award, best documentary), and Good Morning Vietnam with Adrian Cronauer (Gold Award, International Radio Festival of New York) For television, Gunther’s work includes the PBS documentary A Tale of Two Schools, narrated by Morgan Freeman (Cine Special Jury Prize), and the five-part public TV series Exploring Your Brain (Gold Cindy Award).

For the Internet, Gunther developed and now oversees a portfolio of national websites, including BrainLine, Reading Rockets, and Colorin Colorado. Gunther is co-author of Beyond Boardwalk and Park Place (Bantam Books), which was named by the New York Public Library as one of the best young adult books of the year.

He has also written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, Washingtonian, American Journalism Review, and many other publications. He is a graduate of Yale University and Harvard Law School.

Magali Haas, MD, PhD

CEO and President
Cohen Veterans Bioscience

Dr. Haas is Chair, CEO and President of Cohen Veterans Bioscience, a non-profit brain research organization based in New York City whose mission is to fast-track diagnostics and therapeutics to advance precision brain health. Magali has over 15 years of pharmaceutical executive experience, predominantly at Johnson & Johnson, where she assumed broad end-to-end development leadership roles in early & late stage neuroscience clinical development, translational medicine, diagnostics and integrative solutions. To pioneer new approaches for precision therapeutics for brain health, she founded Orion Bionetworks in 2012, which was transformed to Cohen Veterans Bioscience in 2015, while also serving as founding Chief Science and Technology Officer for One Mind for Research. She serves on several advisory boards including Alto Neurosciences, Partnership for Assessment and Accreditation of Scientific Practice, VirtualBrainCloud, Krembil Centre for Neuroinformatics and IMEC for nanoelectronics.  Magali earned her BS in bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania, an MS in biomedical engineering from Rutgers University, and her MD and PhD in neuroscience with distinction from Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

Lee Lancashire, PhD

Chief Information Officer
Cohen Veterans Bioscience

Lee Lancashire, PhD has over 15 years of experience in machine learning and statistics. His PhD was focused on the development of artificial neural network based methodologies where he was involved in many of the first applications of neural nets to high dimensional datasets in bioinformatics.

Prior to joining Cohen Veterans Bioscience, Lee spent over five years within the IP & Science business of Thomson Reuters where he established and led the machine learning and statistical data analysis team. Here he held global responsibility for managing and delivering analytical projects, serving the majority of the top 10 pharmaceutical companies, as well as government, academic and non-profit organizations. These projects focused on utilizing advanced machine learning approaches in the molecular profiling of disease for biomarker discovery, patient stratification and drug target identification.

Lee completed his post-doctoral research in Biostatistics and Bioinformatics at the Paterson Institute for Cancer Research, a Cancer Research UK core facility. He has also worked as a bioinformatics project lead in personalized medicine and diagnostics companies CompanDX and Almac Diagnostics. He has published in over 30 key industry journals and holds several patents around the use of neural networks in the biomedical domain.

In his free time Lee devotes time volunteering as a trustee for the Ichthyosis Support Group, a charity that supports individuals and families affected by a group of rare skin disorders.

Rajeev Ramchand, PhD

Senior Vice President, Research
Cohen Veterans Network

Dr. Ramchand is Senior Vice President-Research at the Cohen Veterans Network (CVN). In this role, he is responsible for designing and guiding CVN’s research agenda and for conducting research within the network.

He comes to CVN after working for 12 years as a behavioral scientist at the RAND Corporation. At RAND, he conducted research on an array of topics including military and veteran mental health, military and veteran caregivers, adolescent delinquency, the impact of disasters on community health, and violent extremism. He has also conducted many studies on suicide and suicide prevention in military, veteran, and civilian populations. This includes epidemiologic studies on risk factors for suicide, evaluations of suicide prevention programs, environmental scans of suicide prevention programs, and has developed tools to help organizations to evaluate their own programs. While at RAND, he received two RAND Gold Medal Awards for his research on suicide prevention and one Presidential Award, RAND’s highest honor, for his work on military and veteran caregivers.

Dr. Ramchand received his B.A. in economics from the University of Chicago and his Ph.D. in psychiatric epidemiology from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.