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Medical & Scientific Advisory CouncIl

Our Medical Advisors are made up of the leading experts in MOG Antibody Disease and other rare neuroimmune disorders. We rely on them to help us educate patients and every resource we have has been reviewed and signed off by one of these authorities to ensure that we provide you with the most accurate and up-to-date understanding according to research.

US Medical Advisory Council

Dr. Michael Levy
Michael Levy, MD, PhD

Massachusetts General Hospital
Harvard University

Dr. Elias Sotirchos US MEDICAL ADVISOR
Elias Sotirchos, MD

Johns Hopkins Hospital
Johns Hopkins University

Dr. May Han US MEDICAL ADVISOR
May Han, MD

Stanford Hospital
Stanford University

Dr. Tanuja Chitnis US MEDICAL ADVISOR
Tanuja Chitnis, MD, FAAN

Brigham and Women's Hospital
Harvard University

Dr. Lauren Tardo US MEDICAL ADVISOR
Lauren Tardo, MD

UT Southwestern Medical Center

US MEDICAL ADVISOR Brenda Banwell
Brenda Banwell, MD, FRCPC, FAAN

Children's Hospital of Philadelphia

Dr. Sean Pittock The Mayo Clinic’s Neuroimmunology Laboratory leading expert
Sean Pittock, MD

Mayo Clinic

Dr. John Chen The Mayo Clinic’s Neuroimmunology Laboratory leading expert
John Chen, MD, PhD

Mayo Clinic

Dr. Eoin Flanagan The Mayo Clinic’s Neuroimmunology Laboratory leading expert
Eoin P. Flanagan, M.B., B.Ch.

Mayo Clinic

Dr Cristina Valencia Sanchez
Cristina Valencia-Sanchez, MD, PhD

Mayo Clinic

Jonathan Santoro, MD
Jonathan Santoro, MD

Chidren's Hospital Los Angeles
University of Southern California

UK Medical Advisory Council

Dr. Jackie Palace
Jackie Palace, BM, FRCP, DM

Oxford University

Yael Hacohen,
Yael Hacohen, MD, PhD

Great Ormond Street Hospital
University College London

Dr. Kish Mankad
Kshitij Mankad MRCP, FRCR, PG Dip

Great Ormond Street Hospital
University College London

Australian Medical Advisory Council

Dr. Sudarshi Ramanathan
Sudarshini Ramanathan, MD, PhD

Kid's Neuroscience Centre
University of Sydney

Dr. Russell Dale
Russell Dale, MD, PhD

Kid's Neuroscience Centre
University of Sydney

Dr. Fabienne Brilot
Fabienne Brilot, PhD

Kid's Neuroscience Centre
University of Sydney

Italian Medical Advisory Council

Elia Sechi, MD
Elia Sechi, MD

University of Sassari

Turkish Medical Advisory Council

Prof. Dr. Ayşe Altıntaş, MD
Prof. Ayşe Altıntaş , MD

Koç University School of Medicine

Scientific Advisory Council

Dr. Lisa K. Ryan, PhD
Lisa K. Ryan, PhD

University of Louisville

Dr. Gill Diamond
Gill Diamond, PhD

University of Louisville

Johns Hopkins Hospital
Johns Hopkins University

Elias Sotirchos, MD

Dr. Sotirchos is an Assistant Professor of Neurology at Johns Hopkins University and Director of the Johns Hopkins Neuromyelitis Optica Center. He earned his medical degree from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and subsequently completed his Osler internship and neurology residency training at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, serving as chief resident in his final year. He then pursued advanced clinical and research training in neuroimmunology at Johns Hopkins as a National Multiple Sclerosis Society Sylvia Lawry Fellow.

Dr. Sotirchos specializes in the diagnosis, management and treatment of neuroimmunological conditions that involve the central nervous system, including MOG-IgG associated disease (MOGAD), neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD), and multiple sclerosis (MS). His research involves the application of imaging techniques, including retinal optical coherence tomography (OCT) and brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), to study these conditions. His work especially focuses on visual pathway involvement in neuroimmunological conditions, and aims to characterize mechanisms of neurodegeneration and to identify novel biomarkers for predicting and monitoring the disease course and therapeutic response.

Stanford Hospital
Stanford University

May Han, MD

Dr. Han is a board-certified neurologist and a clinician-scientist who specializes in multiple sclerosis and central nervous system demyelinating diseases. She was born and raised in Burma (Myanmar) and received her medical degree at the Institute of Medicine (1), Rangoon. She did her post-doctoral fellowship training in protein and membrane lipid biochemistry under the mentorship of Dr. John Glomset at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (University of Washington, Seattle).
She completed Neurology residency at University of Washington-affiliated hospitals and a fellowship in Neuroimmunology (MS) at Stanford with Dr. Lawrence Steinman. She joined the Stanford Neurology department and MS Center in 2009.
Her research focuses on utilizing Systems Biology approach (genomics, transcriptomics and proteomics) to identify targets for therapy in MS and NMO. Dr. Han is also an attending physician at the Neuroimmunology clinic and at the Stanford Hospital.

Brigham and Women's Hospital
Harvard University

Tanuja Chitnis, MD, FAAN

Dr. Chitnis is a Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School, Senior Neurologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Massachusetts General Hospital, and Senior Scientist within the Ann Romney Center for Neurologic Diseases at Brigham and Women’s Hospital where she created the Translational Neuroimmunology Research Center focused on bringing bench discoveries to clinical trials for MOG-AD, multiple sclerosis and neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorders. She created and serves as the Director of the Partners Pediatric MS Center at the Massachusetts General Hospital for Children.
She has published over 250 scientific studies, including key publications on MOG-AD phenotypes and biomarkers. She receives grant funding from the Department of Defense, NIH, National MS Society and the Guthy Jackson Charitable Foundation. She is the recipient of several awards including the Joseph Martin Award for Clinical Research in 2019 from the Scientific Advisory Council at Massachusetts General Hospital, and the 2018 Milestones Award from the National MS Society. In addition to her mentioned positions, she is also a Director of the Translational Neuroimmunology Research Center, The CLIMB Study, and Partners Multiple Sclerosis Center at Brigham and Women’s Hospital as well as a Co-Director for the Partners Multiple Sclerosis Center Fellowship Program.

UT Southwestern Medical Center

Lauren Tardo, MD

Dr. Tardo is an Instructor in the Neuroimmunology division of the Department of Neurology at UT Southwestern Medical Center. She completed medical school at the University of Mississippi School of Medicine and completed her adult neurology residency at UT Southwestern Medical Center. Dr. Tardo remained at UT Southwestern for a fellowship in Neuroimmunology and Multiple Sclerosis with Dr. Benjamin Greenberg. She was trained to diagnose and manage both adult and pediatric patients with anti-MOG antibody associated disease. She is actively engaged in translational research and clinical trials within the Neuroimmunology Section. Dr. Tardo is board certified in neurology by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology.

Children's Hospital of Philadelphia

Brenda Banwell, MD, FRCPC, FAAN

Dr. Brenda Banwell is Professor of Pediatrics and Neurology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania (PENN), and Chief of Child Neurology, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). She also serves as the Co-Lead of the NeuroImmune Program, an innovative age-span program that focuses on multiple sclerosis, MOG-associated disorders and other acquired inflammatory neurological conditions in children and adults.

Dr. Banwell has over 300 scientific publications and has chaired over 50 international courses focused on pediatric demyelinating diseases. Dr. Banwell leads a multisite North American prospective study of clinical outcomes, genetics, immunology, and neuroimaging features of MS in children. She has published studies focused on the clinical characteristics of MOG related disease in children, and on the MRI features of this disease.

Dr. Banwell also serves as the Chair of the International Pediatric Multiple Sclerosis Study Group, and as the Chair of the International Medical and Scientific Advisory Board of the Multiple Sclerosis International Federation. More recently, Dr. Banwell has been asked to serve as a Co-Lead of the MOG International Diagnostic Criteria Working Group, and is a member of the MOG International Consortium.

Dr. Banwell studied medicine at the University of Western Ontario, followed by residencies in pediatrics at the University of Western Ontario and Child Neurology at the University of Toronto. She then pursued a Neuromuscular Fellowship at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN. Dr. Banwell rose to the rank of Full Professor at the University of Toronto prior to relocating to The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia in 2012. Banwell remains as an Adjunct Senior Scientist in the Research Institute at The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto Canada.

Mayo Clinic

John Chen, MD, PhD

Dr. Chen is a Professor of Ophthalmology and Neurology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. He earned his medical and PhD degrees from the University of Virginia and subsequently completed his Ophthalmology residency and Neuro-Ophthalmology fellowship training at the University of Iowa where he was selected as a Heed fellow. He joined the faculty at the Mayo Clinic in 2014 where he works closely with the Neuroimmunology Department and has a special interest in optic neuritis, especially in the setting of MOG antibody-associated disease (MOGAD).
Dr. Chen specializes in the diagnosis, management and treatment of optic neuritis. He works closely with Drs. Pittock and Flanagan, Neuroimmunologists at the Mayo Clinic, to better describe the clinical manifestations of MOGAD. He has expertise in optical coherence tomography and how it relates to optic neuritis, which will be pivotal in understanding this tool as a biomarker of MOGAD optic neuritis outcomes and disease progression. In conjunction with the Neuroimmunology Laboratory, he aims to identify other biomarkers of autoimmune vision loss.

Mayo Clinic

Sean Pittock, MD

Dr. Pittock is a Professor of Neurology, Director of the Neuroimmunology Laboratory and the Center for MS and Autoimmune Neurology at the Mayo Clinic. His expertise is in the laboratory and clinic
based diagnosis and management of immune mediated neurological disorders. He is considered
a leader in the field of glial autoimmunity as it pertains to inflammatory CNS demyelinating
diseases including MS. He currently serves as the chair of the Autoimmune Neurology Section at
the American Academy Neurology. His research is translational, and is focused on

1) the identification of novel biomarkers of autoimmune neurological disease (antibodies to AQP4, GFAP, MAP1B-IgG, Kelch11);
2) the clinical application of laboratory-based tests in diagnosis and outcome prediction for patients with autoimmune and paraneoplastic neurological disorders;

3) optimizing the clinical management of autoimmune and paraneoplastic neurological disorders. 

 

He currently directs the Mayo Clinic Neuroimmunology Laboratory which tests
approximately 200,000 patients for comprehensive neural antibody profiles (CAP and New York
State certified) pertinent to inflammatory CNS disorders. As Director of the Center for MS and
Autoimmune Neurology at Mayo Clinic, he has assisted in building the largest biorepository of
blood and cerebrospinal fluid samples from MS and inflammatory CNS disorders in the world.

Our Laboratory also provides testing for biomarkers of type 1 diabetes allowing collection and storage of more than 1000 serum samples. His research has been supported by Mayo Clinic, NIH (R01) and the Guthy-Jackson Charitable Foundation. He has published more than 300 peer reviewed papers in the field of MS and Autoimmune Neurology. He recently co-edited the first
textbook of Autoimmune Neurology.

Mayo Clinic

Eoin P. Flanagan, M.B., B.Ch.

Dr. Flanagan is a Professor of Neurology and Consultant in the departments of Neurology and Laboratory Medicine and Pathology at the Mayo Clinic (Rochester, MN). He did medical school at University College Dublin in Ireland in 2005 and later pursued neurology residency and neuroimmunology fellowship at Mayo Clinic (Rochester, MN). He received a Master’s degree in clinical and translational science at Mayo Clinic and is principal investigator on an NIH RO1 grant studying the epidemiology, pathology, radiologic features and outcome of Myelin Oligodendrocyte Glycoprotein antibody associated disorder (MOGAD). His clinical expertise and research is focused on MOGAD, aquaporin-4 antibody positive neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD) and transverse myelitis. He directs teaching courses at the American Academy of Neurology on autoimmune encephalitis and myelitis. He works in the Autoimmune and Multiple Sclerosis Neurology Clinics and the Neuroimmunology Laboratory at the Mayo Clinic. He also has an interest in paraneoplastic neurologic disorders, autoimmune encephalitis and the epidemiology of MOGAD, NMOSD and autoimmune encephalitis.

Chidren's Hospital Los Angeles
University of Southern California

Jonathan Santoro, MD

Dr. Santoro serves as the Director of the Neuroimmunology and Demyelinating Disorders Program at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and as an Assistant Professor of Neurology at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California. Dr. Santoro completed his undergraduate, masters, and medical degrees at Tulane University. He subsequently completed residencies in pediatrics and child neurology at Stanford University School of Medicine and obtained sub-specialty training in neuroimmunology and pediatric multiple sclerosis at the Massachusetts General Hospital and Boston Children’s Hospital. Dr. Santoro’s pediatric-specific program is one of the largest on the west coast and utilizes a multi-disciplinary team model that optimizes patient outcomes and improves access to sub-specialty care. Dr. Santoro leads multiple clinical research studies designed at identifying endocrine biomarkers of disease in neuroimmunologic conditions as well as evaluation of specific neurocognitive disease phenotypes. Dr. Santoro is a long-standing advocate for persons with disabilities and has lobbied locally in California and on Capitol Hill through the American Academy of Neurology and the American Medical Association.

University of Louisville

LIsa Ryan, PhD

Dr. Ryan is Associate Professor of Oral Immunology and Infectious Diseases at the University of
Louisville School of Dentistry and holds a joint Courtesy Assistant Professor appointment at the University of Florida College of Medicine. She is an immunologist and toxicologist who has led research on the effects of environment and nutrition on the innate immune system and its role in viral infections such as influenza and Herpes Simplex virus. In addition to faculty positions at the U.S Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA), Rutgers University Health Sciences Center, the University of Florida, and the University of Louisville, she has served as a scientific policy advisor in the U.S. EPA’s Office of Research and Development Office of Science Policy.
She served on many grant review committees for the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Defense’s Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program, the UK’s Medical Research Council, the Italian Ministry of Health, and private foundations.

Dr. Ryan received her Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh in immunotoxicology and inhalation toxicology and was a postdoctoral fellow in pulmonary immunology with Harvard Medical School at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. She also studied microbiology, receiving her M.S. in medical microbiology from West Virginia University and a B.S. in microbiology from Penn State University. She also has industry experience in risk assessment with inhaled and skin-applied consumer products, working as Associate Manager for Inhalation Toxicology and the Established Portfolio for Reckitt.

University of Louisville

Gill Diamond, PhD

Dr. Gill Diamond received his B.A. in biochemistry from the University of Pennsylvania, and his Ph.D. in genetics from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He did his postdoctoral research in the Division of Human Genetics and Molecular Biology at the University of Pennsylvania in the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where he helped pioneer the field of antimicrobial peptides. He was a faculty member at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (a part of Rutgers University) and at the University of Florida.

Currently, he is a Professor in the Department of Oral Immunology and Infectious Diseases at the University of Louisville. His research focuses on innate immunity, and ways to enhance our own immunity to infectious diseases, as well as the development of novel antibiotics and antiviral agents.

Oxford University

Jackie Palace, BM, FRCP, DM

Dr Jacqueline Palace is a consultant neurologist in Oxford and a Professor in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, Oxford University. She is involved in running a national service for neuromyelitis optica and a national service for congenital myasthenic syndromes (CMS) and a lead of the Oxford Multiple Sclerosis group. Her research interests covers MS, NMO, CMS and myasthenia gravis and includes clinical treatment trials, immunological studies, pathology, biomarkers, genetics and imaging studies. She was the clinical lead for the National MS Risk Sharing Scheme which assessed the long-term effectiveness for disease modifying agents in multiple sclerosis, is a board member for the European Charcot Foundation, on the steering committee for MAGNIMS and was the Oxford lead for the European Rare Network for Neuromuscular diseases until Brexit.

Kid's Neuroscience Centre
University of Sydney

Sudarshini Ramanathan, MD, PhD

Associate Professor Darshi Ramanathan is a neurologist and clinician-scientist, with subspecialty expertise in neuroimmunology. She completed her neurology specialisation (FRACP), and was awarded her PhD on the clinical and immunophenotypic characterisation of MOG antibody associated diseases (MOGAD) through the University of Sydney. She undertook a postdoctoral fellowship with the Oxford Autoimmune Neurology Group at the John Radcliffe Hospital and University of Oxford, where she developed expertise in B cell immunology and neuroscience. She has been awarded a number of prestigious fellowships including an NHMRC funded PhD, an NHMRC Neil Hamilton Fairley Early Career Fellowship, and most recently, an NHMRC Investigator Grant. Dr. Ramanathan is a staff specialist neurologist at Concord Hospital where she looks after patients with autoimmune neurological disorders.
In 2013, Associate Professor Ramanathan established and has since been lead investigator of the Australian and New Zealand MOG Study Group, which encompasses over 150 neurologists, immunologists, and ophthalmologists from over 45 centres in the Asia Pacific region. She works closely with Professor Russell Dale and Associate Professor Fabienne Brilot, and leads the evaluation of a cohort of over 500 MOGAD pediatric and adult patients. She leads the Translational Neuroimmunology Group at the University of Sydney. Her clinical and fundamental science research program is focused on understanding disease pathogenesis and improving the diagnosis and treatment of autoimmune neurological disorders including MOGAD, neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder, autoimmune encephalitis, autoimmune muscle disease, and inflammatory neuropathies.

Kid's Neuroscience Centre
University of Sydney

Fabienne Brilot, PhD

Prof Fabienne Brilot obtained her PhD in Belgium and at the JD Gladstone Institutes, UCSF, USA. She then became postdoctoral fellow under the mentorship of Professor Christian Munz (University of Zurich, Switzerland) at the Browne Center for Immunology and Immune Diseases headed by late Professor Ralph Steinman (Nobel Prize for Medicine 2011) at the Rockefeller University, USA. She was recruited at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead in Sydney in 2007 where she started the Brain Autoimmunity Group.
Fabienne is Principal Research Fellow at the University of Sydney, and her research focuses on neuroimmunological brain disorders such as demyelinating disorders and movement and psychiatric disorders. Her group aims to discover biomarkers and explores the autoimmune response in patients to improve their diagnosis and treatment. Through with many collaborations with paediatric and adult neurologists, her team has contributed to the characterization of MOG antibodies and the diagnosis of MOGAD.

Fabienne is a member of the International Society of Neuroimmunology (ISNI) International Advisory board. She is the Secretary of the International Women in Multiple Sclerosis (iWiMS) network. She also is the President of Neuroimmunology Australia, was the Scientific Chair of the 14th International Congress of Neuroimmunology (ISNI) 2018, and is the co-convenor of the 3rd Asia-Pacific School of Neuroimmunology (APSNI) in 2021.

Kid's Neuroscience Centre
University of Sydney

Russell Dale, MD, PhD

Professor Russell Dale is a Professor of Paediatric Neurology at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead and University of Sydney. His primary interests are in autoimmune neurology and the role of the immune system in neurodevelopmental and neuropsychiatric disorders. He is Head of School and Head of the Speciality of Child and Adolescent Health at the University, and clinical director of the Kids Neuroscience Centre, a research centre of 100 researchers. He has published 270 peer reviewed publications, cited 17,000 times on Google Scholar, H factor 67, and has published some important work on the clinical and radiological phenotyping and treatment of autoimmune and inflammatory neurological disorders. He works closely with Dr Darshi Ramanathan and A/Prof Fabienne Brilot on autoantibody neurology syndromes in Sydney, including MOGAD.

University of Sassari

Elia Sechi, MD

Dr. Sechi is a neurology consultant at the Department of Medical, Surgical and Experimental Sciences at the University of Sassari (Italy), where he completed medical school and neurology residency. He was Assistant Professor of Neurology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester (MN, USA), where he undertook a 3-year post-doc Neuroimmunology Research Fellowship and received a Master’s Degree in Clinical and Translational Sciences. His clinical and research interest is in immune-mediated disorders of the CNS, with specific focus on CNS demyelinating disorders, including MOG-IgG-associated disorders (MOGAD) and AQP4-IgG-positive neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorders (NMOSD). He is also interested in disorders of the spinal cord (myelopathies).

Massachusetts General Hospital
Harvard University

Michael Levy, MD, PhD

Dr. Levy is an Associate Professor in Neurology who was recently recruited to lead the new Neuroimmunology Division at the Massachusetts General Hospital. His mission is to build a combined clinical and research neuroimmunology program to develop therapies for patients with autoimmune diseases of the central nervous system. Dr. Levy moved from Baltimore, MD, where he was one of the faculty at Johns Hopkins University since 2009 and Director of the Neuromyelitis Optica Clinic.

Clinically, Dr. Levy specializes in taking care of children and adults with rare neuroimmunological diseases including neuromyelitis optica, transverse myelitis, MOG antibody disease and acute disseminated encephalomyelitis. In addition to four monthly clinics, Dr. Levy is the principal investigator on several clinical studies and drug trials for these conditions.

In the laboratory, Dr. Levy’s research focuses on four main areas:
1. Development of animal models of neuromyelitis optica (NMO) with the goal of tolerization as a sustainable long term treatment: His team generated a mouse model of NMO based on pathogenic T cells reactive against the aquaporin-4 water channel. Now, they are using this mouse model to create a tolerization therapy to desensitize the immune response to aquaporin-4.
2. Genetic basis of transverse myelitis: His team discovered a genetic mutation in VPS37a found in a group of patients with a familial form of transverse myelitis (TM). To understand how this gene is involved in this immune process, they generated a mouse model with this mutation.
3. The immunopathogenesis of MOG antibody disease: This may depend on a subset of T cells called gamma/delta T cells. These specialize T cells react to MOG in mouse models and attack the central nervous system. In addition to understanding why and how these T cells are involved in MOG antibody disease, they are developing a treatment to target these cells.
4. Biomarker assays for other autoimmune diseases of the central nervous system: They are developing assays that detect autoreactive T cells in NMO and MOG antibody disease. In parallel, they are screening for novel antibodies to glial cells in related disorders such as encephalitis and optic neuritis.

Mayo Clinic
Arizona

Cristina Valencia Sanchez, MD, PhD

Cristina Valencia-Sanchez, MD, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of Neurology at Mayo Clinic in Arizona. She is originally from Spain, where she received her medical degree. She completed her neurology residency and multiple sclerosis fellowship at Mayo Clinic Arizona, followed by an autoimmune neurology
fellowship at Mayo Clinic Rochester.
Dr. Valencia-Sanchez is a Senior Associate Consultant at the Multiple Sclerosis and Autoimmune Neurology division at Mayo Clinic Arizona. Her clinical and research focus includes immune-mediated disorders that involve the central nervous system, such as MOG-IgG associated disease (MOGAD), neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorders (NMOSD), multiple sclerosis, autoimmune encephalitis and paraneoplastic neurological disorders.
Dr. Valencia-Sanchez is involved in ongoing clinical trials for autoimmune neurological conditions
including MOGAD.
Dr. Valencia-Sanchez is an editorial board member for the American Academy of Neurology magazine
“Brain Life”, in Spanish.

Great Ormond Street Hospital
University College London

Yael Hacohen, MD, PhD

Yael Hacohen is a senior lecturer in paediatric neurology at University College London and a consultant paediatric neurologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital, London. Yael completed her doctoral studies in 2014, in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neuroscience (NDCN) at Oxford University, where she studied children with autoimmune encephalitis and characterised their clinical and immunological (autoantibody) phenotypes. Yael’s main research interest is precision medicine in acquired demyelinating syndromes such as MOGAD and paediatric multiple sclerosis

Great Ormond Street Hospital
University College London

Kshitij Mankad MRCP, FRCR, PG Dip

Kish Mankad is a Clinical Lead for Pediatric Neuroimaging at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London, with a particular interest in ‘impact radiology’ where diagnostics can be timely, precise, and personalized. His primary academic interests are neuroinflammation, neurooncology, and epilepsy disorders in children. Beyond Medicine, Kish is an educationist and has set up several teaching and training platforms, particularly the Society of Pediatric Neuroimaging, aimed at training healthcare professionals globally. He also has a significant interest in quality improvement in healthcare and is an expert in Lean Six Sigma. 

Koç University Research Center for Translational Medicine (KUTTAM)
Koç University School of Medicine

Prof. Ayşe Altıntaş, M.D.

Prof. Dr. Ayşe Altıntaş became a neurology specialist (Ege University) in 1992, associate professor in 1997, and professor in 2003 (Istanbul University, Cerrahpaşa Medical School). Between 1991-1992, she studied neuroimmunology under the mentorship of Prof. Moses Rodriguez at Mayo Clinic and worked on the experimental model of Multiple Sclerosis (MS). With this work, she was awarded the Eczacıbaşı Medical Incentive Award. In 2001, she worked with Prof.C.Lucchinetti and Prof. B. Weinshenker on the neuroimmunopathological mechanisms, radiological correlations and demyelination / remyelination mechanisms of MS at Mayo Clinic.

 

Between 2005 and 2018, she worked as a “lecturer” in “neuroscience” and “immunology” master and PhD programs at Aziz Sancar Experimental Medicine and Research Institute.

 

She has served on the board of the European Neuroimmunology School for many years, as well as a member of the BioMS-eu working group, the Guthy Jackson Charitable Foundation’s International Scientific Council, MSBase’s Scientific Leadership Group, and as the former coordinator of the Turkish Neurological Association’s Neuroimmunology working group. Establishing her research lab at Koç University Research Center for Translational Medicine (KUTTAM), she is currently focused on inflammatory demyelinating diseases of the central nervous system, primarily MS, NMOSD and MOGAD, with a goal to understand disease mechanisms at the immunopathological level and identify potential biomarkers.

Currently, Prof. Dr. Ayşe Altıntaş has been working at Koç University School of Medicine as an academician and chair of Neurology Department.