ALLARTA - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Pediatrician and Pediatric Hematologist
Dr. Amy Lee Chong is a pediatrician and pediatric hematologist/oncologist with two decades of clinical experience in hospitals such as Our Ladies Children Hospital in Dublin and The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) in Toronto. As a former Canadian oncology portfolio medical director and global metastatic breast cancer medical lead for Eli Lilly, she has extensive industry, medical affairs, and commercialization expertise.
Amy also holds Master's degrees from the University of Toronto (U of T) in Clinical Epidemiology and Healthcare Research and from U of T's Rotman School of Management in Business Administration in Healthcare and Life Sciences.
Dr. Asimina Arvanitaki is a particle physicist who specializes in designing new experiments at the "precision frontier" of theoretical physics. Dr. Arvanitaki is the Stavros Niarchos Foundation's Aristarchus Chair in Theoretical Physics and is the first woman to hold a named chair at the Perimeter Institute in Waterloo, Ontario.
In 2016, she received the New Horizons Prize in Fundamental Physics from the Breakthrough Foundation, and in 2022, she won the CAP-TRIUMF Vogt Medal for her work on subatomic physics. Asimina earned her undergraduate degree from the University of Athens and her PhD from Stanford University.
Job Titles:
- Co - Director of the California NanoSystems Institute
Dr. Craig Hawker is the Co-Director of the California NanoSystems Institute and Director of the Dow Materials Institute at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is a Distinguished Professor, holds the Alan and Ruth Heeger Chair in Interdisciplinary Science and is the Clarke Professor within the California Nanosystems Institute.
Craig is also an award-winning polymer scientist with 75 US patents and co-authored over 600 papers in nanotechnology, materials science, and chemistry. He holds a BSc from the University of Queensland and a PhD from the University of Cambridge.
Job Titles:
- CEO
- Founder
- Professor at McMaster University
Over his 30 years as a Professor at McMaster University, Dr. Harald Stover has become a leading academic researcher in polymer hydrogels, bio-relevant macromolecules and the delivery of biologics. His work is published in leading academic journals, and he is a frequent speaker at international scientific conferences.
His awards include an NSERC/3M Industrial Research Chair, Canada's National Award for Macromolecular Science and Engineering, and his appointment as Director of the NSERC Collaborative Research and Training Experience (CREATE) Program in Biomaterials.
Harald earned his BSc from Technische Universität Darmstadt in Germany, his PhD from the University of Ottawa, and completed his postdoctoral work at Cornell University.
Job Titles:
- Surgeon at Lakeridge Health
Dr. Ikennah Browne is a Thoracic Surgeon at Lakeridge Health and a UBC Master of Health Administration (MHA) alumnus. In 2018, Ikennah co-founded Voyage Biomedical, a medical device company aimed at revolutionizing the treatment of cardiac arrests that was acquired in 2021.
Job Titles:
- Professor at McMaster University
Dr. John G. Kelton is a prominent Canadian hematologist and professor at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. He is the Executive Director of the Michael G. DeGroote Initiative for Innovation in Healthcare at McMaster. In recognition of his significant contributions to healthcare and medical research, Dr. Kelton was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 2015.
John earned his medical degree from the University of Western Ontario and completed his internal medicine and hematology training at McMaster and Duke University. Joining McMaster University in 1977, he held various roles, including Dean and Vice-President of the Faculty of Health Sciences from 2001 to 2016.
Job Titles:
- Professor of Surgery and Medical Imaging at the University of Toronto
Dr. John Trachtenberg is Professor of Surgery and Medical Imaging at the University of Toronto, where he held the Fleck Tanenbaum Chair in Prostatic Diseases at the University of Toronto and University Health Network.
For over 25 years, Dr. Trachtenberg was a uro-oncologist at Toronto General Hospital and the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, where he was also Director of the Prostate Centre. John received his BSc and MD from McGill University.
Job Titles:
- Professor
- Professor, McMaster University
Dr. Juliet Daniel is a professor in the Department of Biology at McMaster University. Her research focuses on cell-to-cell adhesion and signaling, and how their malfunction contributes to cancer.
Dr. Daniel received her BSc from Queen's University and her PhD from the University of British Columbia. She spent six years as a Postdoctoral Fellow at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital and Vanderbilt University before joining McMaster in 1999 to establish her own research laboratory.
Dr. Karen Burke was most recently Director of Regulatory Affairs, Drug Safety and Quality Assurance at Amgen Canada, and before that, Vice President, Regulatory Affairs at AstraZeneca Canada. She served as President of the 4,000-member Canadian Society for Chemistry during the International Year of Chemistry in 2010-2011. Dr. Burke was an active member of the research-based industry trade associations BIOTECanada and Rx&D (now Innovative Medicines Canada) and a member of the Board of Directors of ethicscentre.ca, the Canadian Centre for Ethics & Corporate Policy.
Karen holds a PhD in organometallic chemistry from McMaster University.
Ian Delaney is one of Canada's most storied business leaders and one of the mining world's most respected figures, having served as CEO and President of the global resource firm Sherritt Inc. (formally Viridian) for over 20 years. Before Sherritt, Ian was the CEO and President of the the property firm, Horsham Corporation and was the former President of Merrill Lynch Canada.
Today, in addition to Allarta, Ian also chairs the boards of the Westaim Corporation and the non-profit air ambulance service, Ornge. Ian is a licensed airplane and helicopter pilot.
Job Titles:
- Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School
Dr. Marc Garnick is the Gorman Brothers Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, where he also directs the Hospital's role as a tertiary cancer center for many of its affiliated community cancer centers. He completed fellowships at the National Institutes of Health and oncology training and faculty appointments in oncology at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. He serves as the editor in chief for The HMS Report on Prostate Diseases, and its associated website. He is former a special governmental advisory member of multiple FDA panels and advisory committees. He currently serves on the boards (scientific and corporate) of several life science companies. He has served on the boards of trustees of the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and Penn Medicine and is a trustee emeritus of Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine.
Job Titles:
- Chief Operating Officer
- Founder
As Chief Operating Officer, Maria Antonakos leads all aspects of Allarta's corporate strategy and business development efforts. Before founding Allarta with Dr. Stover, Maria spent 8 years at the world-renowned Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics.
With an eye towards diversity, equity and inclusion, Maria's held senior positions at Roy Thomson Hall and the Canadian Women's Foundation, where she established innovative programs such as Women Play BIG. She also serves as a Board Member of the Leacross Foundation that promotes economic independence to women and children with training focused on the STEM fields.
Maria holds an MBA from the DeGroote School of Business at McMaster University and a BA in Music from University of Toronto.
Job Titles:
- Systems Engineer
- President, Krembil Foundation
Mark Krembil began his career as a systems engineer and currently serves as President of the Krembil Foundation, a family organization that supports medical research in the areas of neurodegeneration, arthritis and autoimmune diseases.
Mark serves on the boards of Agora Open Science Trust, Brain Canada Foundation, Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute (Chairman's Research Advisory Council), TANZ Centre for Neurodegenerative Disease (Campaign Steering Committee), Tanenbaum Open Science Institute (Leaders Council), and the University of Toronto (Campaign Steering Committee).
Job Titles:
- Member of the Abdominal Organ Transplant and HPB Surgery Team at the UHN Transplant Program
Dr. Reichman is a member of the Abdominal Organ Transplant and HPB Surgery team at the UHN Transplant Program at Toronto General Hospital (TGH). Additionally, he serves as the Surgical Director of the Pancreas Transplant Program and directs the surgical fellowships for abdominal transplantation and HPB surgery at the University of Toronto.
Dr. Reichman completed his General Surgery residency at the University of Chicago Medical Center and then pursued a fellowship in Abdominal Organ Transplantation and HPB Surgery in Toronto.