Speakers & Chairs

Dr Elin Bernson is a researcher at the University of Gothenburg focusing on NK cells in gynecological diseases. She holds a PhD from the University of Gothenburg, supervised by Professor Fredrik Bergh Thorén, and a Master’s degree in Biotechnology from Chalmers University of Technology. Following

Véronique Braud is a Research Director at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and leads a research group at the Institut de Pharmacologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire (IPMC), part of Université Côte d’Azur in Valbonne, France.

Yenan Bryceson is an Assitant Professor at the Department of Immunology, Karolinska Institutet and Professor II at the Department of Clinical Sciences, University of Bergen. His lab investigates the mechanisms of lymphocyte cytotoxicity, with a particular focus on understanding human primary

Dr. Caligiuri is a physician–scientist whose basic and translational work has focused on immunotherapy for both liquid and solid tumors. His laboratory has studied human natural killer (NK) cells for 35 years. He recently completed his five-year term as President of the City of Hope National

Dr. Carrington is currently the Director of the Basic Sciences Program, Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research. She is also a Principal Investigator within the Laboratory of Integrative Cancer Immunology at the National Cancer Institute, a Visiting Professor at Harvard University, and a

Roberta Castriconi is an Associate Professor at the University of Genoa, specifically within the Department of Experimental Medicine – DIMES (Department of Experimental Medicine) of the School of Medical and Pharmaceutical Sciences. She carries out research and teaching activities in the fields of

Dr. Marco Colonna became a scientific member of the Basel Institute for Immunology (Basel, Switzerland). Since 2001 he has been a Professor of Pathology & Immunology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, MO, USA. Since 2019 Dr. Colonna is a member of the National Academy of

Daniel M. Davis is Head of Life Sciences and Professor of Immunology at Imperial College London. His research using microscopy has helped pioneer the nanoscale biology of immune cell recognition and the immune synapse. He has published over 150 scientific papers and is a Fellow of the Academy of

Mariapia Degli-Esposti is an immunologist whose work has provided seminal insights into the immune system’s response to viruses. She defined cellular and molecular mechanisms that enable pathogen protection whilst limiting immunopathology. Her work revealed novel interactions and immunoregulatory

Dr Rebecca Delconte is a Group Leader in the department of Cancer Immunology at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre. She obtained her PhD from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute and subsequently completed her postdoc at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Dr Delconte’s laboratory at the

Delphine Depierreux trained as a virologist in Belgium (M.Sc. 2015) and learnt immunology at the University of Cambridge (Ph.D. 2020). She studied natural killer (NK) cells in pregnancy during her postdoctoral training in Francesco Colucci’s group (2020-2022). She joined Julie Overbaugh’s group at

James Di Santo obtained MD/PhD from Cornell Medical College and the Sloan Kettering Institute in NYC, pursued postdoctoral training with Pr Alain Fisher (Necker Hospital, Paris) and Pr Klaus Rajewsky (Institute for Genetics, Cologne) before creating his own laboratory in 1999 at the Institut

Clara Di Vito is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Medical Biotechnologies and Translational Medicine of the University of Milan, Italy. Graduated in Medical Biotechnology at the University of Pavia in 2007, Dr Di Vito obtained her PhD in Molecular Medicine at the University of Eastern

Todd A Fehniger, MD/PhD is a Professor of Medicine at Washington University School of Medicine (WashU) where he serves as Co-Leader of the Siteman Cancer Center Hematopoietic Development and Malignancies Program and Laboratory Director of the Center for Gene and Cellular Immunotherapy. He has

David Finlay is Professor in Immunometabolism in the Schools of Biochemistry and Immunology, and Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Science at Trinity College Dublin. He was awarded a B.A. (Mod) in Biochemistry in 2001. He completed his PhD (2006) and postdoctoral training at the University of Dundee in

Dr. Binqing Fu is now a professor and PI at the University of Science and Technology of China. Her research centers on both fundamental and translational studies of uterine natural killer (NK) cells. Key discoveries include elucidating the immune regulation of decidual NK cells and their important

Prof Clair Gardiner has a research interest in human Immunology, in particular Natural Killer (NK) cells. She has extensive experience and interest in human infectious diseases including HCV and HIV-1, and the contribution of the innate immune response to disease outcome.

Petter Höglund is Head of Department/prefekt at the Department for Medicine, Huddinge (MedH) and research Group Leader for Immunological tolerance and transfusion immunology at HERM, KI. He is professor of basic immunology, especially clinically applied cell therapy and transplantation, at the

Katharine C. Hsu is medical oncologist and hematologist who cares for people with bone marrow disorders, leukemias, lymphomas, and certain types of solid tumors. I specialize in allogeneic (donor provided) bone marrow and stem cell transplants. My research focuses on the biology of the natural

Stipan Jonjic is Professor and Chair of the Center for Proteomics, University of Rijeka, Faculty of Medicine. His research interest has primarily focused on the physiology of the immune response to viral infection using the mouse cytomegalovirus (MCMV) as a model. His group was first to discover

Dr. Kaufman is a Professor of Medicine and vice chief of the Division of Regenerative Medicine. Studies in the Kaufman lab have pioneered the development of human iPSC-derived natural killer (NK) cells to kill diverse types of human cancer cells. This work has been translated to clinical trials.

Dr. Barbara Kee is a Professor at the University of Chicago, where she is Chair of the Committee on Cancer Biology and an active member of the Committee on Immunology. Her research focuses on the transcriptional programs that promote the development and function of innate immune cells, including

Salim Khakoo has worked on NK cells, their receptors and their role in liver disease. Based in the Clinical and Experimental Sciences Division at the University of Southampton his research has been instrumental in uncovering how genetic variation in killer-cell immunoglobulin-like receptors (KIRs)

Gaetana Laselva è una reumatologa con esperienza presso l'IRCCS De Bellis a Bari. Si occupa di patologie reumatiche e terapia del dolore, con particolare attenzione al lupus eritematoso sistemico. Collabora con altri specialisti in un team multidisciplinare e offre nuove terapie biologiche per

Prof. Miguel López-Botet, MD PhD, was SNI president (2005-2008) and holds an appointment as Prof. emeritus at Univ. Pompeu Fabra (Barcelona). His interest on human NK cell biology started along the development of his PhD Thesis on T cell-mediated NK-like activity (1982), supervised by Prof. M. O.

Dr. Emily Mace is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, where she leads a laboratory focused on understanding human lymphocyte development and function. She earned her PhD from the University of British Columbia in 2010 and did postdoctoral training with

Mala Maini is a Professor of Viral Immunology in the Institute of Immunity and Transplantation, Division of Infection and Immunity at UCL, London and an Honorary Consultant Physician in the viral hepatitis clinic. Her lab studies adaptive immunity to hepatitis B, liver cancer and SARS-CoV-2 to

Prof. Karl-Johan Malmberg (M.D. Ph.D) is a Specialist in Hematology with over 25 years of experience in NK cell research and cancer immunotherapy. He is the Director of a Norwegian Research Council Center of Excellence, The Precision Immunotherapy Alliance (PRIMA) and leads an international team of

Prof. Mandelboim received his Ph.D. in Immunology from the Weizmann Institute of Science, followed by a post-doctorate fellowship at the Harvard Medical School. He then joined the Department of Immunology and Cancer Research at the Faculty of Medicine at the Hebrew University, to establish a

Alberto Mantovani, MD, is Emeritus Professor of Pathology at the Humanitas University in Milan, Emeritus Scientific Director of the Istituto Clinico Humanitas and Chair of Inflammation and Therapeutic Innovation, William Harvey Research Institute, Queen Mary University, London, UK. His attention

Emanuela Marcenaro is Full Professor of Histology at the University of Genoa, where she also serves as Vice-President of the Strategic University Center for Safety, Risk, and Vulnerability. She is an active member of the University Technology Transfer Commission, sits on the Department Board, and

Professor Maria Matteo is a specialist in Gynecology and Obstetrics. Her main areas of expertise include endometriosis, assisted reproductive technology (ART), polypectomy, myomectomy, uterine metroplasty, diagnostic and operative hysteroscopy, and infertility. She is currently Head of the

Dr. J. Mikulak Ph.D., has been working at Humanitas since 2010, and currently holds the position of Senior Research Scientist at the Clinical and Experimental Immunology Unit. Her main areas of expertise include human innate immunity, immuno-oncology, and virology. She earned her Ph.D. in

Dr. Miller is currently a Professor of Medicine at the University of Minnesota. He is currently the Director of the University of Minnesota Masonic Comprehensive Cancer Center. He has more than 25 years of experience studying the biology of NK cells and other immune effector cells and their use

Ashley Moffett qualified in medicine from the University of Cambridge and worked as a physician before training as a reproductive pathologist in The Rosie Maternity Hospital in Cambridge. For the last 30 years she has worked on the interactions between maternal uterine cells and placental

Luis J. Montaner, DVM, DPhil, is Executive Vice President of The Wistar Institute (wistar.org), Director of the HIV Cure & Viral Diseases Center, and Herbert Kean, MD, Family Professor. He leads the BEAT-HIV Delaney Collaboratory (beat-hiv.org) and iCure program (personalized HIV cure platform

Professor Lorenzo Moretta currently serves as Head of the Department of Immunology, Ospedale Pediatrico Bambino Gesù (Rome). He is formerly Full Professor of General Pathology and Pathophysiology of the University of Genoa Medical School (1994 – 2015), as well as Scientific Director of the Istituto

Christian Münz has been trained in immunology at the German Cancer Research Institute, the University of Tübingen and the Rockefeller University in New York, USA. He became Assistant Professor and Head of Laboratory at the Rockefeller University in 2003. In 2008 he was recruited as Associate

Paul Norman is a Research Associate in the Parham Laboratory in the Department of Structural Biology at Stanford University, where he has been since 2003. He received his PhD from King's College, London UK, through studying Immunogenetics. He investigates how natural selection has defined HLA and

Eric O'Neill is a Full Professor of Cell and Molecular Biology at the University of Oxford, Department of Oncology. He is a dedicated researcher at the forefront of biomedical science, with a profound commitment to translating cutting-edge research into tangible benefits for patients. Currently, he

Dr. O’Sullivan is an Associate Professor of Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics. He received his Doctor of Philosophy Degree (Ph.D.) in Biomedical Science from the University of California San Diego. Dr. O’Sullivan’s thesis work focused on the interactions between the innate immune

Daniel Olive is professor of immunology at Aix Marseille University. He is also in charge of the "Immunity and Cancer" research team of INSERM UMR1068 of Marseille Cancer Research Center (Institut Paoli Calmettes). He is the head of the first IBiSA Platform dedicated to Cancer Immunomonitoring

Jordan Orange, MD, PhD, is a world-renowned scientist and pediatrician with a deep research interest in immunological function. His mechanistic studies have given insight into immunological diseases as well as basic immunobiology giving rise the potential to harness immunity for therapeutic

Dimitra Peppa is an Associate Professor in HIV Immunology and Honorary HIV Consultant at the Institute of Immunity and Transplantation (IIT), UCL. She runs an immunology research lab studying immunity in human disease including chronic viral infections with HIV, HBV and emerging viral infections

Dr. Sumi Rajagopalan received her Ph.D. in Immunology from the Tufts University School of Medicine. After postdoctoral research with Dr. Michael Brenner at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, she joined the Laboratory of Immunogenetics (LIG) at the National Institute of

Professor Raulet is a tumor and viral immunologist who holds the Esther and Wendy Schekman Chair in Cancer Biology at UC Berkeley and directs Berkeley’s Immunotherapeutics and Vaccine Research Initiative. He is an elected member of the US National Academy of Sciences, a recipient of the William B.

Dr Francesca Reggiani (Ph.D.) is a Junior Principal Investigator at the Translational Research Department of AUSL-IRCCS of Reggio Emilia, Italy. She graduated in Animal Biotechnology at the University of Bologna and completed her research training abroad in different Austria- and UK-based research

Katy Rezvani, MD, PhD is a professor of medicine at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, where she serves as the Vice President & Head, Cell Therapy Institute for Discovery and Innovation, Sally Cooper Murray Chair in Cancer Research, and medical director of the GMP Facility. She

Sarah Robertson is a Professor of Reproductive Immunology and NHMRC Investigator Fellow at the Robinson Research Institute, University of Adelaide. Her research focusses on the immunobiological determinants of successful conception and embryo implantation, in order to understand the mechanisms of

Chiara Romagnani is an Italian immunologist specialising in innate immunity. Her particular interest is in innate lymphoid cells (ILCs) and their dual role in wound healing and inflammation processes. Her working group succeeded in identifying signals that control the pro- and anti-inflammatory

Marco Scioscia works as a senior consultant in Obstetrics and Gynaecology at the Mater Dei Hospital of Bari, Italy, as Director of the Gynaecological Surgery Unit. He received his M.D. degree from the University of Bari Aldo Moro and his Ph.D. degree in foetal medicine from the University of Rome

Malcolm is based in the Oxford Centre for Immuno-Oncology and his research focuses on receptors of the immune system that detect MHC molecules with a focus on natural killer cell receptors. Malcolm was awarded his PhD in 2016 from Imperial College London and conducted his post-doctoral training at

Dorothy K. Sojka joined the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Loyola University Chicago, Health Sciences Campus, as an Assistant Professor in 2020. She earned her Ph.D. at the University of Rochester in Rochester, NY, and completed her postdoctoral training at Washington University in

Antonio Giovanni Solimando graduated from Bari Medical School University, Italy, in 2011 (Magna cum Laude) and is a resident doctor in internal medicine since 2012. He has been active in both, clinical and pre-clinical translational research activities at the Internal Medicine Unit, Department of

Joseph Sun is a Member in the Immunology Program at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and Professor and Director of the Immunology and Microbial Pathogenesis Program at Weill Cornell Medical College. His research is focused on the cellular and molecular mechanisms behind immunological

Dr. Sunwoo was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. He received his undergraduate degree from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island and his medical degree from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. He completed his training in Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery at Washington

Dr. Antigoni Triantafyllopoulou is a professor of Innate Immunity in Rheumatic Diseases at the Charite Universitätsmedizin Berlin and leads a group on the role of innate cells in chronic inflammation at the German Rheumatology Research Center (DRFZ) in Berlin. She obtained a medical degree and a

Dr. Trinchieri was most recently the Director of the Schering Plough Laboratory for Immunological Research in Dardilly, France, and an NIH Fogarty Scholar at the Laboratory for Parasitic Diseases, NIAID. Since August 2006, he has been the Director of the Cancer and Inflammation Program, and Chief

John Trowsdale PhD FMedSci MAE FRSB is an Emeritus Professor of Immunology at Cambridge University. After postdoctoral work on bacterial genetics at the CNRS in Paris, and the Scripps Clinic in California, he joined Sir Walter Bodmer’s laboratory in Oxford, which then moved to Cancer Research UK

Éric Vivier, DVM, Ph.D., is a Professor of Immunology at Aix-Marseille University and at the Public Hospital of Marseille (AP-HM). In addition, he was appointed in 2018, Scientific Director of Innate Pharma, a biotechnology company dedicated to improving cancer treatment with innovative therapeutic

Christian Vosshenrich earned his PhD in the laboratory of Klaus Rajewsky at the Institute of Genetics, University of Cologne, where he worked on B cell development. He then moved to Paris to join James Di Santo’s laboratory at the Institut Pasteur, where he began studying NK cells, with a

Stephen Waggoner began his scientific career in 1995 as a high school intern at the National Cancer Institute, developing skills in molecular biology and a passion for scientific communication. During his undergraduate studies in Biology and Chemistry at St. Mary’s College of Maryland, he

Carsten Watzl studied Biology in Heidelberg. During his PhD work at the German Cancer Research Centre in Heidelberg in the department of Peter Krammer, he focused on the signal transduction of the CD95 (APO-1/Fas) receptor (back then he was called Carsten Scaffidi). As a postdoctoral researcher he

Wayne M. Yokoyama, MD, the Sam and Audrey Loew Levin Professor of Medicine, Pathology and Immunology and director of the Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) at Washington University School of Medicine, the nation’s largest MSTP, is honored for his efforts to enhance the training of premier

Simona Zompì, MD, PhD is a senior R&D leader in immunology with over 15 years of experience advancing immunotherapeutics from discovery through IND. She has led cross-functional global teams driving innovation across cell and gene therapies, biologics, and vaccines in oncology, autoimmune and