Speakers

Daniel Ontaneda, MD, PhD FAAN, is a professor of neurology at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University and a staff neurologist at the Cleveland Clinic Neurological Institute’s Mellen Center for Multiple Sclerosis. He is the Director of Research at the Mellen Center for Multiple Sclerosis. His research focuses on imaging outcome measures for MS and imaging based clinical trials.

His research is funded by the National Institutes of Health, National Multiple Sclerosis Society, Race to Erase Foundation, Department of Defense, and Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute. Dr. Ontaneda serves on the board of ACTRIMS and LACTRIMS. He currently serves on the NAIMS executive committee. Dr. Ontaneda is an Editor for JAMA Neurology and Multiple Sclerosis Journal.

Jodi Haartsen is an experienced Neurosciences Nurse practitioner with over 25 years of expertise in brain health and neurological care. She began her career in Neurosurgery, working for a decade at Monash Medical Centre and St Vincent’s Public in Melbourne. She then transitioned into stroke research, contributing to community-based studies with the Alfred Chronic Disease team.

She joined Eastern Health in 2000, including Clinical Nurse Educator and MS Nurse Practitioner. In 2020, she became the Executive Manager of Client Engagement and Wellbeing at MS Plus, where she led initiatives to enhance patient care and support services.

Currently, Jodi is the Alfred Brain Improvement and Innovation Lead at Alfred Health, where she focuses on advancing brain health strategies and improving neurological care. She holds multiple postgraduate qualifications, including a Master of Nursing and a Master of Leadership, and has contributed to several national and international committees dedicated to brain health and multiple sclerosis research.

Professor Anne-Louise Ponsonby BMedSci, MBBS, PhD, FAFPHM, FAFHMS is an epidemiologist and public health physician. Ponsonby is Head of Neuroepidemiology of the Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health. Ponsonby has extensive experience population-based studies, then public health translation. Her early work provided information on sudden infant death / prevention with a subsequent de line in SIDs mortality in Australia and internationally.

More recently, Ponsonby’s work has been on combining population epidemiologic approaches with system biology. Ponsonby is using this approach, to investigate mind and brain diseases. A particular focus is the potential impact of environment on multiple sclerosis and understanding the molecular pathways. Ponsonby has over 500 publications and several patents. As a public health physician, Ponsonby has a highly active and consistently ongoing role in research translation and preventative medicine.

Professor Jeannette Lechner-Scott is a senior staff specialist in the Department of Neurology, Newcastle, and a conjoint Professor at the University of Newcastle.

She is the head of the Neuroimmunology clinic at John Hunter Hospital in Newcastle and the deputy director of the Immune Health Program in the Hunter Medical Research Program.

Professor Lechner-Scott is on the Board of Directors of MS Plus and MS Australia. She is a member of MSIF and the chief editor of MSARD.

She is the recipient of the 2023 Ian McDonald Award for Outstanding Research in Multiple Sclerosis. She received the award for Research Excellence in 2024 and was nominated for the National MS Research Award by MS Australia in February 2025.

Her research stretches over various fields (genetics/epigenetics, new MRI technologies, pregnancy, cognition in MS, etc), but always has the person with MS in its centre.

Prof. Rajiv Khanna obtained his doctorate degree from India and undertook his post-doctoral training at the Queensland Institute of Medical Research (QIMR), Brisbane Australia. He is the Co-Director of Queensland Immunology Research Centre and currently appointed as Distinguished Scientist at QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute. Prof. Khanna is also appointed as Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Cyteph Pty Ltd, Honorary Professor at the University of Queensland and Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. Prof. Khanna is a Fellow of Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences and was awarded Order of Australia in 2017. He has extensive expertise in immunotherapy clinical trials, herpesvirus immunology and vaccine development. Over the last two decades, his group has successfully translated his research towards the development of novel T cell-based immunotherapeutic strategies for the treatment of transplant recipients and autoimmune diseases. Prof. Khanna is currently appointed as a consultant to Atara Biotherapeutics, Dynavax Technologies and Cellevolve Bio for the development of novel immunotherapeutics, diagnostic technologies and vaccines. He is also appointed on Scientific Advisory Board of Atara Biotherapeutics. Prof. Khanna has been invited by various national and International organizations for expert advice on developing clinical guidelines and scientific review.