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David Nott is a highly experienced General and Vascular Surgeon. He is an authority in laparoscopic (keyhole) surgery and was the first surgeon to combine laparoscopic and vascular surgery.

David was the first surgeon in the world to perform a totally laparoscopic distal arterial bypass (at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in 1999) and the first in Europe to carry out a laparoscopic abdominal aortic aneurism repair (Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, 1998).

David has written over 100 papers on various aspects of Vascular and General Surgery.

David has a keen interest in war surgery and works for Médecins Sans Frontières and the International Committee of the Red Cross, and spends time each year providing assistance in war-torn countries such as Afganistan, Iraq and Sudan.

Specialties:General and Vascular Surgery, Laparoscopic Surgery, Keyhole Surgery

Dr Ahmed Hankir works as an Academic Clinical Fellow in General Adult Psychiatry at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust in the UK.

He holds academic posts as Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Mental Health Research in association with Cambridge University and Academic Clinical Fellow in General Adult Psychiatry at King's College London. In recognition of his research and scholarly outputs and his services to public engagement and education (he has lectured to over 75,000 people in 19 countries on five continents worldwide) Dr Hankir was was appointed Visiting Professor of Academic Psychiatry at the Carrick Institute for Graduate Studies in Cape Canaveral, USA.

​Born in Belfast and raised in Dublin and England, he moved to Lebanon where he spent his formative years. When the country was ravaged by civil war, he was forced to leave his family behind at 17 years of age and returned to the UK where he started off as a janitor. He went on to graduate from Manchester University Medical School.

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Robin Coupland is a medical adviser in the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

He joined the ICRC in 1987 and worked as a field surgeon in Thailand, Cambodia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Angola, Somalia, Kenya and Sudan. He has developed a health-oriented approach to a variety of issues relating to violence and the design and use of weapons.

A graduate of the Cambridge University School of Clinical Medicine, UK, he trained as a surgeon at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital and University College Hospital, London. He became a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1985. He is the holder of a Graduate Diploma in International Law from the University of Melbourne in Australia.

As part of his current position he has focused on the effects of violence and weapons both conventional and non-conventional. He has developed a public health model of armed violence and its effects as a tool for policy-making, reporting and communication.

His current work has two tracks: first, the feasibility of an ICRC operational response in the event of use of nuclear, radiological, biological or chemical weapons; second, improving security of health care in armed conflicts. He has published medical textbooks about care of wounded people and many articles relating to the surgical management of war wounds, the effects of weapons and armed violence.

Henry works as a Doctor in Emergency Medicine, and as a National Lead for Health Informatics. He has served with the Royal Navy and Royal Marines, mainly concentrated in Afghanistan where he worked alongside the Afghan Government in assisting the reconstruction of community medical provision. He is currently a Deployable Civilian Expert for the UK's Stabilisation Unit and an officer in the Royal Marines Reserves.

Following medical training and subsequent specialist training in Medical Oncology at Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge and the Royal Marsden Hospital, Sarah was awarded a CRUK Junior Clinician Scientist PhD fellowship in 1999 at Cambridge University and held a Clinical Fellowship at the Institute of Cancer Research’s Drug Development Unit.

She was appointed as Senior Lecturer and Honorary Consultant at Imperial College in 2006 and became Director of Imperial’s Early Cancer Trials Unit and established her laboratory studying the dysregulation of mRNA translation in cancer. She has been chief or principal investigator for a number of national and international clinical studies.

My research endeavors seek to bridge advances in novel technologies and therapeutics with current clinical oncology needs.

Prior formal intensive training in biomedical research design at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health and at the National Institutes of Health places me in a unique position to translate advances in the lab to the bedside. Moreover, I have broadened my skill set in clinical investigation by completing the Scholars in Clinical Science Program, a two year structured training curriculum that led to a Master of Medical Sciences from Harvard Medical School.

I also completed a clinical fellowship in Oncology through the Dana-Farber / Partners Cancer Care Program.

This breadth of clinical training exposed me to the day to day quandaries across the spectrum of solid and hematological tumors.

As I refine my oncology focus to solid tumors, notably ovarian cancers under the auspices of Prof. Michael J. Birrer and pancreatic tumors, I am poised to ask further challenging clinical questions in need of innovative solutions. Previously, I was involved with nanoparticle MRI imaging research at the National Cancer Institute where I truly first appreciated the meaning of interdisciplinary. I continue the spirit of this approach as an investigator in the MGH Center for Systems Biology led by Prof. Ralph Weissleder.

My objectives are to refine and translate novel molecular imaging and nanosensing tactics into solid tumors. Notably, for ovarian carcinomas these include micro-Nuclear Magnetic Resonance technology and for pancreatic tumors, novel combo PET tracer - therapeutics.

My daily research interactions involve an amalgam of chemists, material scientists, physicists, and clinicians as we continue to strive for interdisciplinary, innovative solutions to tackle biological problems plaguing cancer researchers.

Dr. Boruta was born and raised on the shore of Lake Michigan.

He graduated magna cum laude with both his B.S. in Biology and his M.D. degree from the University of Michigan.

As a resident in Obstetrics and Gynecology at the combined Brigham and Women's/Massachusetts General Hospital Residency Program he was elected Administrative Chief Resident. Following completion of fellowship training in Gynecologic Oncology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, he was a faculty member at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.

In 2008, he returned to Massachusetts General Hospital and is currently Assistant Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Medicine at Harvard Medical School.

His primary clinical and research focus involves development and utilization of minimally invasive surgical techniques in the diagnosis and management of gynecologic cancers.

Dr Birrer is vice chancellor and director of the Winthrop P. Rockefeller Cancer Institute at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS).

Birrer completed his medical degree and doctorate of philosophy in 1982 in the Medical Scientist Training Program at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. Following a medical internship and residency at Massachusetts General Hospital, Birrer entered the Medical Oncology Fellowship program at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Maryland. After his fellowship, Birrer was appointed senior investigator (with tenure) and established the molecular mechanism section in the Division of Cancer Prevention and Control.

In 2008, Birrer was appointed professor of medicine at the Harvard School of Medicine and assumed the position of director for both Gynecologic Medical Oncology at Massachusetts General Hospital and the Gynecologic Oncology Research Program at the Dana Farber/Harvard Cancer Center.

In 2017, he accepted the position of director of the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where he served as professor of medicine, pathology and OB-GYN.

Recognized nationally and internationally as an expert in gynecologic oncology, Birrer’s primary research interest is in characterizing the genomics of gynecologic cancers to improve the clinical management of these diseases. His clinical interests include ovarian cancer, endometrial cancer and cervical cancer.

Birrer has approximately 400 publications, including peer-reviewed manuscripts, book chapters and review articles. He served as chair and chair emeritus of the Department of Defense Ovarian Cancer Research Program, chair of the Committee for Experimental Medicine of the Gynecologic Oncology Group, chair of the Translational Science Working Group of the Gynecologic Cancer Intergroup, and a member of the Gynecologic Cancer Steering Committee.

Dr. Whitfield Growdon was born and raised in Boston. He graduated from Williams College with a degree in Art History. After years of appreciating fine arts in the Berkshire Mountains, he attended the University of Massachusetts Medical School. There he metAmanda, and 5 days before graduation, they were married in Salem, MA.

He returned to Boston where he was a resident atthe integrated Brigham & Womens/MGH Combined OBGYN Residency, and alsocompleted a gynecologic oncology fellowship at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

His interests include minimally invasive surgery and correlative investigationinto rare gynecologic tumors. He lives in downtown Boston with his wife and his 2 year olddaughter Lily who lights up his world.

Nicholas Thomas qualified from the London Hospital in 1988. Following general surgical training he completed the Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons FRCS (Glasgow) and FRCS (England) in 1993. He trained in neurosurgery at the Atkinson Morley’s Hospital, Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children and the National Hospital, Queen Square in London in addition to a year’s Spinal Fellowship at Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio. He completed the FRCS in Surgical Neurology in 1998.

He was appointed a Consultant Neurosurgeon at King’s College Hospital, London in 1998 at the age of 33. With a broad clinical practice, sub-specialty interests include complex spinal surgery, anterior and lateral skull base surgery (including vestibular schwannoma surgery) and endoscopic pituitary and skull base surgery. Within these, he has a particular interest in chordoma, condrosarcoma, basilar invagination, craniopharyngioma and acoustic neuroma.

He runs a national multi-disciplinary dedicated to neurofibromatosis and von Hippel Lindau disease clinic. 

He is widely acknowledged as one of the world’s leading Skull Base surgeons and the pioneer of endoscopic Skull Base surgery in the UK and as such he is UK President of the British Skull Based Society. 

He is a valued panel member on international workshops on endoscopic pituitary surgery (e.g. Guy’s and St Thomas’ and Coventry) as well as ‘open’ lateral skull base surgery (e.g. Copenhagen Skull Base Course).

For the past 22 years he has visited Sri Lanka to lecture and perform operations with local neurosurgeons at the National Hospital and Sri Jayawardenapura Hospital in Colombo on a charitable basis.