WSSFN 2021

Short Biography: Edward Chang is the Joan and Sanford Weill Chair and Jeanne Robertson Distinguished Professor of Neurological Surgery at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Chang’s clinical expertise is surgical therapies for epilepsy, pain, and brain tumors. He specializes in advanced neurophysiologic brain mapping methods, including awake speech and motor mapping, to safely perform neurosurgical procedures in eloquent areas of the brain. His research focuses on the discovery of cortical mechanisms of high-order neurological function in humans. Dr. Chang’s laboratory has demonstrated the detailed functional organization of the human speech cortex and has translated those discoveries towards the development of a speech neuroprosthetic device to restore communication for people living with paralysis. Dr. Chang is the 2015 Blavatnik National Laureate in Life Sciences and member of the National Academy of Medicine.

Short Biography: G. Courtine is Professor of Neurosciences at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), and Adjunct Professor in the neurosurgical department of the University Hospital Lausanne (CHUV) and Faculty of Medicine and Biology of the University of Lausanne (UNIL). Together with functional neurosurgeon Prof. Jocelyne Bloch, he founded and lead the Defitech Center for Interventional Neurotherapies, named .NeuroRestore. .NeuroRestore develops neurotherapies involving surgical interventions to improve recovery from neurological disorders. G. and Jocelyne also founded ONWARD Medical to scale up their neurotherapies to widely available clinical treatments. G. is Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) of ONWARD Medical N.V., which is now traded on Euronext (ONWD).

Short Biography: Dr. Haseltine is a Neuroscientist whose research focused on sensory physiology and brain plasticity. After completing post-doctoral training in Neuroanatomy at Vanderbilt University, he applied his expertise in sensory physiology to the aerospace industry, before moving to Disney where he developed Virtual Reality displays for theme parks. Dr. Haseltine was Executive Vice President in charge of R&D at Disney when he was recruited to run the Research Directorate at NSA after 9/11, then was promoted to oversee science and technology for the entire US Intelligence community as its first CTO. He is currently CEO of Discovery Democracy, a startup that makes sophisticated industrial sensors. A named inventor on 67 patents and neuroscience journalist for Psychology Today, he is the author of 5 books, including the Amazon Bestseller, The Spy in Moscow Station.

Short Biography: Peter Konrad, MD PhD is the Chair of the Department of Neurosurgery at West Virginia University and JW Ruby Professor of Neuroscience and Neurosurgery in the Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute. He completed graduate degrees from Purdue University in Biomedical Engineering and Physiology developing device technology for cardiac implants (MS ’85) and motor systems physiology (PhD ’88) under Presidential Medal of Technology Awardee – Dr. Leslie Geddes. He became very interested in implantable medical device technology and neural engineering and sought to become a neurosurgical expert in the field of neurological implants. After completing medical school from Indiana University in 1991, he went on to Vanderbilt for neurosurgical residency and finished in 1997.

Dr. Konrad remained at Vanderbilt from 1998 until 2020, where he grew one of the largest clinical programs in deep brain stimulation (DBS) and functional neurosurgery. During his time at Vanderbilt, Dr. Konrad was able to mentor over 37 graduate students and clinical fellows in all areas of neurological devices and neuroscience research. He developed partnerships with numerous colleagues internationally in neuromodulation and neurological device research. He brings 22 years of federal and industry funded research experience as well as over 110 peer reviewed publications in the field of functional neurosurgery and neural engineering. He has served as advisor to the Congress of Neurological Surgeons on medical devices and was a Board of Director member of the American Association of Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery. Presently after 17 years on the Board of the North American Neuromodulation Society (NANS), he is the immediate past-president of the society.

In 2020, Dr. Konrad accepted the Executive Director of Clinical Translational Neuroscience position at the RNI and in 2022 was named as Chair of the Department of Neurosurgery within the Institute. Dr. Konrad continues to have a passion for clinical translational research, especially in neurological device technology. Beyond the application of new technology to clinical neuroscience, Dr. Konrad is charged with helping lead neurological device research across the breadth of the Institute. In doing so, he enjoys mentoring students and faculty, acknowledging that innovation in healthcare depends on seeing through the eyes of discovery in others.

Short Biography: Dr. Lozano is a neurosurgeon and University Professor at the University of Toronto. He is best known for his work in the field of Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) and Magnetic Resonance-guided Focused Ultrasound (MRgFUS). His team has mapped cortical and subcortical circuits in the human brain and has advanced novel treatments for Parkinson’s disease and for depression, dystonia, anorexia, Huntington’s and Alzheimer’s disease.
Dr. Lozano has over 750 publications and serves on the boards of several international organizations. He has trained over 70 international post-doctoral fellows. He has received a number of honors including Doctor Honoris Causa from the University of Sevilla, the Olivecrona Medal, the Pioneer in Medicine Award and the Dandy Medal. He has been elected to the Royal Society of Canada, has received the Order of Spain and is an Officer of the Order of Canada.

Short Biography: Dr. Morishita is an Associate Professor and chief of functional neurosurgery unit in the Department of Neurological Surgery at Fukuoka University Faculty of Medicine, Fukuoka, Japan. He serves as an active board member for academic societies such as World Society for Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery and The Japanese Congress of Neurological Surgeons. He is also an editor for scientific journals including World Neurosurgery and Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.

Dr. Morishita’s clinical practice covers a wide variety of neurological disorders, including movement disorders, intractable pain, spasticity, epilepsy, and stroke. His primary research interest is in neuroimaging analysis of neuronal circuits associated with deep brain stimulation (DBS) for movement and neuropsychiatric disorders. Especially, he is highly recognized for the connectomic studies visualizing 3D neuronal networks associated with electrical stimulation fields. His research projects have been supported by JSPS (KAKENHI) and other foundations. He is actively working to expand the application of functional neurosurgical procedures to new fields.

Short Biography: Russell R. Lonser received his M.D. from Loma Linda University. Upon completion of his residency the University of Utah (2001), he joined the staff of the Surgical Neurology Branch at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). He was Chief of the Surgical Neurology Branch at NIH before becoming Professor and Chair of the Department of Neurological Surgery at Ohio State University in 2012. He holds the Dardinger Family Chair in Neurosurgical Oncology.

Dr. Lonser’s research interests include development of drug delivery paradigms for the central nervous system pathology. He is an author on over 350 scientific and clinical publications. He received the Tumor Young Investigator Award from the American Association of Neurological Surgeons/Congress of Neurological Surgeons Section on Tumors (2001) and Mahaley Clinical Research Award from the American Association of Neurological Surgeons/Congress of Neurological Surgeons Section on Tumors (2013). He was the American Association of Neurological Surgeons/Congress of Neurological Surgeons Section on Tumors Bittner Lecturer (2017) and the American Academy of Neurological Surgery Edward H. Oldfield Lecturer (2018).

His contributions to organized neurosurgery include membership on the Executive Committee of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. He was the Treasurer and President of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. He is the Secretary of the American Board of Neurological Surgeons. He was the head of the Research Subcommittee in Head, Neck and Spine Injury Committee for the National Football League for 10 years. He has been actively involved in the mentoring and training of over 40 neurosurgical fellows. He has served on the Editorial Boards for NEUROSURGERY, World Neurosurgery and Journal of Neurosurgery. He is Academic Editor for PLoS One and Science Reports. He is Consulting Editor for Neurosurgery Clinics of North America and Associate Editor for Neurosurgery. He has edited 4 drug delivery and neurosurgical textbooks.