David L. Porter, MD (Chair) Jodi Fisher Horowitz Professor in Leukemia Care Excellence Director, Blood and Marrow Transplantation Perelman School of Medicine University of Pennsylvania Health System Philadelphia, PA

David L. Porter, MD, is the Jodi Fisher-Horowitz Professor of Leukemia Care Excellence at the Perelman School of Medicine and Abramson Cancer Center, and Director of the Blood and Marrow Transplantation and Cellular Therapeutics program at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.  He is a graduate of the University of Rochester and earned his medical degree at Brown University.  He completed his internship and residency at Boston University Hospital, and fellowship training at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston.

He Chairs or serves on numerous local, national and international committees focused on hematologic malignancies, hematopoietic stem cell transplantation and cell therapy.  He is the Vice Chair of the Board of Directors of the National Marrow Donor Program and a member of the American Board of Internal Medicine Hematology Exam Committee.  Dr Porter is a member of the American Society of Hematology, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, and the American Society of Blood and Marrow Transplantation.  He has authored more than 170 research articles and book chapters, is an Associate Editor for the American Journal of Hematology and has served as a manuscript reviewer for numerous high impact medical journals.  He is the recipient of several prestigious awards at the University of Pennsylvania including recognition for Professionalism and Mentorship.  He is annually recognized as a “Top Doc” in Philadelphia Magazine and Castle Connolly and has been the recipient of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society Service to Mankind Award.

Dr. Porter has expertise in development of novel cellular therapies, in the care of patients with hematologic malignancies including acute and chronic leukemia, and in all aspects of hematopoietic SCT.  He leads numerous local and national research activities.  He is an accomplished clinical investigator with principal research interests in development of novel methods of cellular therapy, stem cell transplantation, and allogeneic adoptive immunotherapy.  Dr. Porter has worked with colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania to pioneer successful development of CAR T cells (genetically modified T cells) to treat B cell cancers like ALL, NHL and CLL.  Other research highlights include development of novel trials designed to prevent GVHD after allogeneic SCT by blocking lymphocyte trafficking, and studies to enhance graft-vs-tumor activity at the time of transplant, after non-myeloablative therapy, and for relapse after SCT.

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Jacqueline C. Barrientos, MD, MS Division of Medical Oncology and Hematology Northwell Health Cancer Institute Donald & Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell Lake Success, NY

Jacqueline C. Barrientos, MD, is Attending Physician at the Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL) Research & Treatment Program of the Division of Hematology and Medical Oncology, Department of Medicine, the Northwell Health Cancer Institute in Lake Success, New York.  She is Associate Professor of Medicine at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell.

Dr. Barrientos received her medical degree at the Ponce School of Medicine where she was the recipient of two Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellowship award. She completed her internship and residency in internal medicine at Yale-New Haven Hospital of the Yale School of Medicine, and her fellowship in Hematology/Oncology at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City, where she also served as Chief Fellow and completed a Masters degree in Clinical Investigation at the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences. She is board certified in hematology and oncology. Dr. Barrientos is Principal Investigator on several clinical trials involving targeted agents. She has received several awards including the American Society of Hematology Harold Amos Medical Faculty Development Program Award and the Paul Foundation Innovation Award.

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Ira Braunschweig, MD Director, Stem Cell Transplantation Clinical Program Director Hematologic Malignancies Montefiore Medical Center Bronx, NY

Ira Braunschweig, MD, is currently the Director of Stem Cell Transplantation and Clinical Program Director Hematologic Malignancies at the Montefiore/ Einstein Center for Cancer Care.

Dr. Braunschweig graduated The New York University School of Medicine in 1992. After doing his residency in Internal Medicine at North Shore University Hospital Manhasset, N.Y., he trained in Hematology/Oncology and Stem Cell transplantation at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas and stayed on as a faculty member for three years.

For the last 16 years, Dr. Braunschweig has built the stem cell transplant/cellular therapy program at Montefiore into a robust program that performs over 115 transplants per year that includes autologous, allogeneic matched, matched unrelated donors, as well as haploidentical transplants.

Dr. Braunschweig has been at the forefront of the CAR-T cell revolution. He is a co-author on the pivotal Zuma-1 study which established CAR-T therapy as a standard for relapsed and refractory malignant lymphoma(New England Journal of Medicine December 2017).

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Adam D. Cohen, MD Director, Myeloma Immunotherapy Assistant Professor of Medicine University of Pennsylvania Health System Philadelphia, PA

Adam D. Cohen, MD, received his medical degree and did his internal medicine residency at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.  He completed a hematology/oncology fellowship at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York, including research training in the Laboratory of Tumor Immunology under Alan Houghton, MD.  He then served as faculty on the Hematology Service at Fox Chase Cancer Center, Philadelphia.  Currently, he is Director of Myeloma Immunotherapy, and an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the Abramson Cancer Center, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.

Dr. Cohen is board certified in medical oncology and hematology.  He is a member of ASCO, ASH, and AACR.  He is also a member of the Multiple Myeloma Committee, Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group, and has served on the NCCN Multiple Myeloma Guidelines Panel.  He is a medical advisor for the Myeloma Beacon, and an ad hoc reviewer for Leukemia, Blood, and Clinical Cancer Research, among other journals. His research interests involve novel therapeutics for plasma cell diseases, particularly vaccines and cellular immunotherapies.  He has co-authored over 50 original articles, chapters, and reviews on cancer vaccines, tumor immunity, multiple myeloma, amyloidosis, and stem cell transplant.

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Dennis L. Cooper, MD Chief, Blood and Marrow Transplantation Medical Oncologist Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey New Brunswick, NJ

Dennis L. Cooper, MD, is the Medical Oncologist and Chief Section of the Blood and Marrow Transplant Program, Professor of Medical Oncology at Rutgers Cancer Institute, and an Attending Physician at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital. Dr. Cooper spent more than 30 years at Yale Cancer Center and became the Director of the Yale Stem Cell Transplant Program in 1997 and remained in that position for over 17 years. His major areas of clinical expertise are multiple myeloma, Hodgkin lymphoma, non­ Hodgkin lymphoma disease. His proudest accomplishment is the World Series victory of the Chicago Cubs.

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Heather DiFilippo, MSN, CRNP Certified Adult Nurse Practitioner University of Pennsylvania Health System Philadelphia, PA

Heather DiFilippo, MSN, CRNP, is a nurse practitioner in the Department of Hematology Oncology and Bone Marrow Transplant at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. She has been a nurse practitioner since 2003 and specializes in hematologic malignancies as well as bone marrow transplant and immunotherapy. She has played an active role in managing patients receiving cellular therapy since 2009, and provides ongoing patient education as well as direct patient care during and after infusion. Ms. DiFilippo attended Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia where she received a Bachelor of Science in psychology, before continuing on to pursue a Bachelor of Science in nursing at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. While working in oncology at Jefferson University Hospital, she completed her Master of Science in nursing as well. Ms. DiFilippo is a Board Certified Adult Nurse Practitioner and licensed in Pennsylvania.

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Sergio A. Giralt, MD Melvin Berlin Family Chair in Myeloma Research Professor of Medicine, Weill Cornell Medical College Chief Attending, Adult BMT Service Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center New York, NY

Sergio A. Giralt, MD, is the Chief of the Adult Bone Marrow Transplant Service in the Division of Hematologic Oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York.  He is affiliated with Weill Cornell Medical College as a Professor of Medicine.  He received his medical degree from Universidad Central de Venezuela in Caracas, Venezuela, and completed his postgraduate internship at the University Hospital of Caracas.  He also completed an internal medicine residency at Good Samaritan Hospital in Cincinnati, Ohio and a postdoctoral fellowship in hematology and oncology at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.

Board Certified in internal medicine and hematology, Dr. Giralt holds membership in several professional societies, including the American Society of Hematology, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the North American Society of Blood and Bone Marrow Transplantation, and the International Society of Hematology.  He holds key positions with several organizations including the International Bone Marrow Transplant Registry Executive Committee, the Blood and Marrow Transplant Clinical Trials Network (BMTCTN) Steering Committee, the National Marrow Donor Program Board of Directors, and the Clinical Advisory Board of the Web site, Managing Myeloma.  He is the past President of the American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation as well as the Past Chair of the BMT-CTN and the Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research.

Dr. Giralt’s clinical research career has focused in three areas

1) Developing better tolerated conditioning regimens for older or medically infirmed patients with hematologic malignancies to allow them access to this procedure

2) Developing novel HCT therapies (conditioning regimens plus post transplant therapies) for autologous and allogeneic HCT for myeloma

3) Pursuing strategies that will significantly reduce HCT symptom burden and toxicities

As Chief of the Adult BMT Service, he has had extensive experience designing, implementing, and performing HCT studies both as a principal investigator and as a collaborator.

Dr. Giralt has published over 400 articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature and written chapters for several books. Additionally, Dr. Giralt is a reviewer and editorial board member for several journals.

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Jamie L. Koprivnikar, MD Attending Physician Division of Leukemia The John Theurer Cancer Center Hackensack University Medical Center Hackensack, NJ

Jamie L. Koprvinikar, MD, specializes in hematology and medical oncology and is board certified in both. She also holds a board certification in internal medicine.

Dr. Koprivnikar received her medical degree from the Sidney Kimmel Medical College, formerly Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University, in Philadelphia, PA. She completed her internal medicine residency at MedStar Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, DC. She then completed a fellowship in hematology and oncology, also at MedStar Georgetown University Medical Center. She was chosen to serve as chief fellow during her third and final year of fellowship.

Dr. Koprivnikar spent the early part of her career on faculty at MedStar Georgetown University Medical Center where she was active in teaching medical students, residents, and fellows. She also served as the medical co-director of the Patient Blood Management Program and was active on the institutional review board and as an investigator on many clinical trials. She is a member of the American Society of Hematology.

In her current practice, at the John Theurer Cancer Center, she focuses on leukemias, myelodysplastic syndrome and other bone marrow failure disorders such as aplastic anemia and paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria.  She is an active investigator on numerous clinical trials.

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Deepu Madduri, MD Assistant Professor of Medicine Hematology and Medical Oncology Mount Sinai Medical Center New York, NY

Deepu Madduri, MD, is an Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Multiple Myeloma Program at Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York, NY.   She is also an oncology consultant at Foundation Medicine, Inc., a cancer genomic company, and lead their Smart Trials Precision enrollment program.

Dr. Madduri specializes in plasma cell disorders including multiple myeloma, amyloid light-chain (AL) amyloidosis, POEMS syndrome, plasmacytoma and monoclonal gammopathies of uncertain significance (MGUS).  She performs a variety of procedures including bone marrow biopsy, and stem cell transplant.   Dr. Madduri serves as the lead physician liaison between the Multiple Myeloma Program and the Bone Marrow Transplant Program at Mt. Sinai Hospital which has significantly eased the transition in between the two departments for the patients undergoing an autotransplant.

Her research interests include immunotherapy with checkpoint inhibitors, and immune effector cells such as Car-T therapy, NK-cell therapy, and Bi-specific antibodies.

Dr. Madduri received her medical degree from the University of Oklahoma School of Medicine in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. She completed her residency in internal medicine at St. Mary Medical Center and a fellowship in Hematology and Oncology at the University of California, Harbor Campus in Torrance, California.  She did another fellowship in Blood and Marrow Transplant at Stanford Hospital; and received her undergraduate degree from the University of Oklahoma.

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Nigina Mirazimova, MSN, RN, OCN® Patient Care Director New York-Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medicine New York, NY

Nigina Mirazimova, MSN, RN,  OCN^®, is the Patient Care Director of the Outpatient Oncology at NYP/WC. In her role, she oversees Adult and Pediatric Infusion Centers, Apheresis and Bone Marrow Transplant Department. Before this role, she oversaw clinical operations of the Infusion Suite at Maimonides Cancer Center. Nigina holds a master’s in nursing with Adult Gerontology Nurse Practitioner and Adult Clinical Nurse Specialist degree. Currently, she is pursuing the Doctoral in Nursing Practice degree.

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Gwen L. Nichols, MD Executive Vice President, Chief Medical Office The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society Rye Brook, NY

Gwen L. Nichols, MD, received her BA from Williams College and received her MD with Honors from the State University of New York.  She trained in internal medicine at the University of Chicago, and did her hematology-oncology fellowship at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center where she served as Chief Fellow.  She did post-doctoral research and was a leukemia service attending at MSKCC before being recruited to Columbia University as Director of the Hematologic Malignancies Program.

At Columbia she was the Principal Investigator on numerous clinical trials, ran an active translational research laboratory, and was an Advisory Dean of Students.

Committee service included numerous grant review committees, the SWOG Leukemia Committee, and the Education Committee of ASCO.  She continues to serve on the Scientific Advisory Board for the International Waldenstrom’s Macroglobulinemia Foundation.   She was chosen “Physician of the Year” at Columbia and received the Humanism in Medicine Award.

Dr. Nichols joined Roche in 2007 and led the MDM2 franchise.  In 2013 she became the Translational Medicine Group Head for Molecularly Targeted Therapeutics and Oncology for the Roche Innovation Center in New York.  As of March 2017, Dr. Nichols joined the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society as their Chief Medical Officer, where she oversees their mission including research, patient access, education, public policy, and advocacy.

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Ran Reshef, MD, MSc Associate Professor of Medicine at CUMC Director, Translational Research Blood and Marrow Transplantation and Cell Therapy Program Division of Hematology/Oncology and Columbia Center for Translational Immunology New York-Presbyterian Columbia University Irving Medical Center New York, NY

Ran Reshef, MD, MSc, is the Director of Translational Research in the Blood and Marrow Transplantation and Cell Therapy Program at Columbia University Medical Center. He is the clinical lead of the CAR-T cell program for both commercially available CAR-T and experimental cell therapies that are still in clinical trials. He directs a research lab in the Columbia Center for Translational Immunology and he is a member of the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Dr. Reshef’s research revolves around immunotherapy approaches for the treatment of cancer and his lab studies novel ways to improve the efficacy and the safety of immunotherapies including bone marrow transplants, checkpoint inhibitors and CAR-T cells. He has authored or co-authored more than 60 original research publications related to cancer and bone marrow transplantation and has received research funding from the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, National Cancer Institute, Conquer Cancer Foundation, Department of Defense, National Marrow Donor Program and the American Society of Hematology.

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Gunjan L. Shah, MD Adult Bone Marrow Transplant Service & Center Health Policy and Outcomes Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center New York, NY

Gunjan Shah, MD, received her MD at Temple University School of Medicine in 2008.  She completed her internal medicine residency training at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, hematology/oncology fellowship at Tufts Medical Center, and BMT fellowship at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Dr. Shah joined Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in 2016 as an Assistant Attending and is part of the Adult BMT Service and the Center for Health Policy and Outcomes. Dr. Shah`s research has focused on improving access, tolerability, and outcomes for patients with lymphoma and myeloma undergoing autologous and allogeneic stem cell transplantation and CAR T cells, as well as comparative and cost effectiveness of treatments for the hematologic malignancies.

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Mari Lynne Silverberg, MPA, RN, BSN, OCN® Sr. Quality Management Nurse—Cellular Therapy Department of Nursing Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Cent New York, NY

Mari Lynne Silverberg, MPA, RN, BSN, OCN^®, has been involved in Oncology nursing for the last 30 years, being a Certified Oncology Nurse for the last 25. She has cared for patients as a staff nurse in both the inpatient and outpatient settings, and held leadership positions throughout her career, with a concentration on office practice and infusion.

During one of her positions while she was responsible for a busy Hematology-Oncology and Gynecological Oncology Office Practice and Infusion Center, Mari Lynne was also tapped to become a quality officer for the Bone Marrow Transplant Program supported by her units. This role afforded her the opportunity to learn BMT from the inside out, to prepare and participate in FACT inspections and lead quality initiatives through audit findings and patient reviews. She flourished in the role.

Mari Lynne’s current position as a Senior Quality Management Nurse at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center allows her to utilize her leadership skills, clinical background and quality experience to establish policies, procedures, quality metrics, education programs and processes to continue to build the Center’s Immune Effector Cell program. She has assisted in creating various nursing and patient-care documents, as well planning and executing the REMS training (Risk Evaluation Mitigation Strategies) trainings required by the FDA for commercial CAR T cells for over 400 applicable staff, while supporting and completing other infrastructure needs.

Mari Lynne continues to enjoy her integral role in MSK’s Cellular Therapy program, as well as in preparing this program and the HSCT program for regulatory inspections, participating in ongoing quality reviews and initiatives and providing other support as necessary.

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Koen van Besien, MD, PhD Director, Bone Marrow and Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant Chief, Bone Marrow Transplant Service Professor of Medicine Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine Division of Hematology Medical Oncology New York-Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medicine New York, NY

Koen van Besien, MD, PhD, is a graduate of the College ND de la Paix in Namur, Belgium and from the University of Leuven, Belgium where he also did his clinical training in Medicine. He holds a PhD from the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands. He did a hematology/oncology fellowship at Indiana University and in Bruges, Belgium. Afterwards he was on the faculty in the transplant program at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston Texas. He directed the Transplant program at the University of Illinois from 1997 until 2001 and the Transplant and Lymphoma programs at the University of Chicago from 2001 until 2011.

Dr. van Besien is the Director of the  Stem Cell Transplant Program, a  Professor of Medicine  at Weill Cornell Medical College and Attending Physician at the New York-Presbyterian Hospital.

Dr. van Besien has established a national and international reputation with several research and clinical interests. He has devoted considerable efforts at developing novel treatment strategies for patients with recurrent lymphoma, including the introduction of novel drugs and treatment in salvage therapy and in transplant conditioning regimens. He also has developed novel methods of transplantation for those patients who lack matching donors. Most recently his group has described a novel concept of haplo-cord transplantation with extremely encouraging results.

Dr. van Besien has over 210 publications in peer reviewed journals and his research continues to be supported by NIH. He is a member of the editorial review boards of the journals Bone Marrow Transplantation and Biology of Blood and Marrow Transplantation. He is also Editor in Chief of the journal Leukemia and Lymphoma.

Dr. van Besien oversees the transplant program at Weill Cornell Medical College/New York Presbyterian Hospital. Deciding on stem cell, umbilical cord or bone marrow transplant is complex. One’s care involves a large number of health care professionals and a team approach. Weill Cornell Medical College/New York Presbyterian Hospital has world class facilities and a transplant team that provides superb care and has access to the latest clinical research. We are lucky to have renowned leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma experts who are intimately involved in the decision process. New York Presbyterian is consistently ranked among the very best hospitals in the nations. If complications arise, we can therefore count on the help of some of the best experts in a variety of disciplines including infectious diseases, pulmonary, gastro-enterology.

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Elizabeth A. Weber, BSN, RN Commercial Cellular Therapy Coordinator University of Pennsylvania Health System Philadelphia, PA

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Weber, BSN, RN, is the Commercial Cellular Therapy Coordinator at Penn Medicine. She received her nursing degree from Widener University. She graduated with Honors and was the recipient of the Pediatric Excellence in Care Award as well as the Undergraduate Nursing Research Award. She spent the start of her nursing career as an inpatient nurse on a Neuroscience Medical-Surgical Floor at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. During this time, she was awarded “Neuroscience Nurse of the Year” and served as Unit Council Chair for a two-year term.

In her current role, Lizzie collaborates with leadership to establish organizational systems to safely provide patient care for cellular therapy candidates. She coordinates complex care for cellular therapy recipients (actual or potential) as patients navigate through the evaluation of, preparation for and care post cellular therapy infusion. She provides ongoing patient/family education based on evaluation of the individual needs of patients/families. She also participates in collaborations with manufacturers, professional organizations and other institutions to disseminate information regarding lessons learned operationalizing a Commercial Cellular Therapy Program.

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