SPEAKERS

The Scientific and Organising Committees are pleased to announce the opening list of Invited Speakers taking part in the NDLR 2026 program.

**please note this is a preliminary list of speakers and will continue to be updated on regular basis**

Associate Professor Marta Chesi, PhD

Associate Professor of Medicine at Mayo Clinic, Phoenix Arizona, USA

Dr. Chesi studies the biology of multiple myeloma, a tumor of antibody-producing cells in the bone marrow that leads to anemia, renal insufficiency and bone disease. She is interested in identifying the genetic events that lead to myeloma development and progression, in modeling their effects in vivo, and in developing personalized therapeutic strategies that target the cancer cells while boosting the immune system.

Professor Ari. M. Melnick, MD

Gebroe Family Professor of Hematology/Oncology and Professor of Medicine, Immunology and Pharmacology at Weill Cornell Medicine College (WCMC), New York City, USA

Ari Melnick, MD, completed a residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in hematology/oncology, as well as a postdoctoral fellowship at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, USA.

Dr. Melnick’s research interests include the biology and molecular targeting of B-cell lymphomas and acute leukemias, targeting transcriptional and epigenetic repressors for cancer therapy, and identifying the epigenetic basis of hematologic malignancies. He and his research associates have a developed novel therapies to correct aberrant transcriptional regulation and signaling in these tumors. Dr. Melnick has authored more than 300 published manuscripts in journals such as Nature, Science, Cell, Cancer Discovery, Cancer Cell, Nature Medicine, Nature Immunology, and the New England Journal of Medicine. He is a past ASH Faculty Scholar, LLS Scholar, Burroughs Wellcome Translational Research Scholar and Kimmel Foundation Scholar and is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the American Association of Physicians.

Lindsey Montefiori, PhD

Research Associate, Department of Pathology,
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital

Lindsey Montefiori, PhD, is a Research Associate at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Her research investigates the gene-regulatory mechanisms of oncogenic transcription factors in acute leukemia, with a particular focus on lineage ambiguous leukemias. Her work ultimately aims to uncover the molecular basis of gene-regulatory networks that drive leukemia development and identify new therapies that counteract these pathways. She received her PhD from the University of Chicago, Department of Human Genetics and subsequently trained with Dr. Charles Mullighan, MBBS, MSc, MD for her postdoctoral research prior to becoming a Research Associate. She has received funding from the LLS and the NCI to support her research.

A/Professor Jessica Nordlund, PhD

Associate Professor (Docent) and Research Group Leader at Uppsala University | Managing Director, National Genomics Infrastructure at SciLIfeLab Uppsala | co-founder SPLATomics

Dr Jad Othman

Haematologist at Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney

Dr Jad Othman is a clinical and laboratory haematologist at Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney and Research Fellow at The University of Sydney. His research focus is on the application of molecular diagnostics and MRD to the treatment of patients with acute myeloid leukaemia, having completed a fellowship at the AML MRD lab at Kings College London. He is an active contributor to the ALLG AML/MDS working party and the European LeukaemiaNet international working group for MRD assessment and validation in AML (ELN-DAVID).

Dr Elliot Stieglitz

Pediatric oncologist at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals

As a physician-scientist, Dr. Stieglitz focuses his clinical and laboratory investigations on improving outcomes for children with juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia (JMML). He has conducted several clinical trials for patients with JMML, including NCT05849662, which is currently risk-stratifying JMML patients to receive different intensities of therapy based on a DNA methylation assay. Current lab-based investigations include developing CAR-T therapies and targeted inhibitors using mouse models of JMML.