Dr. Marie-Ève Paquet completed her PhD in immunology in 2004 after working under the supervision of David Williams. Her research has focused on the molecular aspects of processing MHC class I antigen in emergency rooms and trafficking to the cell surface. She completed a post-doctoral training in Hidde Ploegh’s lab at Harvard and the Whitehead Institute (MIT) where she used her expertise to develop genetically engineered mice to study the translocation processes of proteins from the ER to cytosol and explore the relationship between viruses and the immune system.

She then joined CERVO to create a viral vector platform focused on optogenetics. Dr. Paquet runs the Canadian Neurophotonics Platform viral vector core localized at the CERVO Brain Research Center. With her team, she now distributes quality vectors to more than 200 laboratories in 12 Canadian universities and 5 institutes as well as several other universities around the world. She is also a member of the executive board of the Canadian Science Platforms Network which was created to network, raise awareness, promote shared science platforms and influence their funding.

Dr. Jeremy Brown is an Affiliate Scientist at Nova Scotia Health, a Professor in Dalhousie University’s Faculty of Engineering, and a co-founder of multiple medtech start-ups. Currently, Dr. Brown is focused on developing the next generation of ultrasound imaging and therapeutic technologies. Working alongside a team of neurosurgeons, he has created a cutting-edge device aimed at improving cancer patient outcomes using minimally invasive surgical techniques. The tiny device, which measures 3mm x 3mm, is the world’s first high-resolution endoscopic surgical and imaging probe. It combines two different technologies; an ultrafast imaging platform which will allow surgeons to detect and reach brain tumours, and a therapeutic tool that will non-invasively vaporize tissues.

Steve Arless, BSc’71 (Chemistry), returned to his alma mater, McGill University, in the Fall of 2016 as Professor of Practice in the Faculty of Medicine in the Department of Surgery’s cutting-edge Surgical Innovation Program. More recently, he joined one of Canada’s fastest growing medical technology accelerators, Centech, as Entrepreneur-in-Residence. Academically speaking Mr. Arless completed an MBA at Concordia University in 2008 and then lectured there for several years thereafter.

After graduating from McGill, Mr. Arless worked for 17 years at Smith & Nephew Inc., serving as President/CEO for close to five years.

His innovative talent led him to CryoCath Technologies Inc., a catheter-based cryoablation technology for the treatment of Atrial Fibrillation, which he nurtured from a start-up to commercial success, serving as President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) from 1996 to 2006, ultimately resulting in a successful exit to Medtronic. He maintained his interest in the diagnosis of and minimally invasive therapies for rhythm disorders of the heart, assuming the position of CEO of Cleveland-based CardioInsight, from 2009 to 2012, with the Company ultimately being acquired by Medtronic.

Mr. Arless then moved on to becoming the Co-Founder, CEO and Chairman of the Board (2015-2019) of Soundbite Medical, a Montreal-based shockwave technology company, also in the field of cardiovascular disease therapy.

While at SoundBite, he also initiated a MedTech business incubator and accelerator program at Centech/ETS (Ecole de Technologie Superieure) as well as accepting the position as Professor of Practice within the Faculty of Medicine of McGill University. He continues to work in these two teaching and mentoring capacities.

Most recently (March, 2020), Mr Arless founded and currently leads (as former CEO and current Executive Chairman) ViTAA Medical Solutions, an AI-driven digital health company using cardiac-gated CT imaging data to aid physicians in the better management of patients with AAA (abdominal aortic aneurysms).

His most notable award was Ernst & Young’s 2005 Entrepreneur of the Year in the life science category.

Hassan Rivaz is an Associate Professor and a Concordia University Research Chair at the ECE Department with a joint appointment at the PERFORM Centre. He is also the Founding Director of the IMPACT Lab: IMage Processing And Characterization of Tissue.

Dr. Rivaz is an Associate Editor of IEEE Trans. Medical Imaging (TMI, since 2017), IEEE Trans. Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics and Frequency Control (TUFFC, since 2018), and IEEE Open Journal of Engineering in Medicine and Biology (OJEMB, since 2021).

He is a member of the Organizing Committee of IEEE EMBC 2020 in Montreal, IEEE ISBI 2021 in Nice, and IEEE IUS 2023 in Montreal.

He has served as an Area Chair (AC) and Program Committee (PC) of MICCAI for 6 years since 2017, and was an AC of IPCAI 2022. He co-organized tutorials on advances in ultrasound imaging at IEEE ISBI 2019 and IEEE ISBI 2018. He also co-organized the CURIOUS 2018, CURIOUS 2019 and CuRIOUS-SEG 2022 Challenges on registration of ultrasound and MRI in neurosurgery, and the CereVis 2018 Workshop on Cerebral Data Visualization, all in conjunction with MICCAI.

Prof. Cohen-Adad is an MR physicist and software developer with over 15 years of experience in advanced MRI methods for quantitative assessment of the brain and spinal cord structure and function. He is an associate professor at Polytechnique Montreal, adjunct professor of neuroscience at the University of Montreal, associate director of the Neuroimaging Functional Unit (Univ. Montreal), member of Mila (Univ. Montreal) and he holds the Canada Research Chair in Quantitative Magnetic Resonance Imaging. Along with his colleagues Prof. Nikola Stikov, Prof. Alonso-Ortiz and Prof. De Leener, he is co-directing the NeuroPoly Lab (www.neuro.polymtl.ca), which includes about 30 graduate students and research associates. Prof. Cohen-Adad’s research is highly cited (Google Scholar). As a leader in the field, he organized multiple workshops at international conferences (https://spinalcordmri.org/workshops.html). He is a frequent guest lecturer on advanced MRI methods and he regularly serves as consultant for various companies (e.g. Biospective Inc., NeuroRx, IMEKA) and academic (Harvard, U. Toronto, UCL, UCSF, etc.) for setting up MRI acquisition and image processing protocols.