Speakers

Dr. Nicholas Ashton is a world leader in the development, validation and use of fluid biomarkers, including cerebrospinal fluid and blood tests, in the fight against Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders.

He is the senior director of the Banner Research Fluid Biomarker Program. Dr. Ashton is advancing biomarker research, working closely with academic and industry researchers inside Arizona and around the world. The program is establishing a destination center for the development and use of cerebrospinal fluid and blood-based biomarkers in the fight against Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders.

This program includes two laboratories at Banner Sun Health Research Institute and involves researchers from that campus and Banner Alzheimer’s Institute. The biomarker discovery laboratory will develop, optimize and validate new spinal fluid and blood tests for Alzheimer’s disease, and other neurodegenerative and cerebrovascular diseases, including home-based tests. This sets the stage for the widespread use of blood tests in research studies, treatment and prevention trials, and the clinical setting.

This lab will provide a state-of-the-art resource for the performance of rapid, rigorous and high-throughput resource biological fluid assays for academic and industry researchers to advance the scientific understanding, treatment and prevention of neurodegenerative and cerebrovascular diseases and leverage the latest immunoassay and mass spectroscopy platforms, reagents, and methods.

Dr. Ashton received his Ph.D. in 2017 from King’s College London in the group of Professor Simon Lovestone and has been an associate professor in the group of Henrik Zetterberg and Kaj Blennow at University of Gothenburg, Sweden since 2019. Dr. Nicholas Ashton has a decade of experience in biofluid analysis and assay development for Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders, which ranges from discovery mass spectrometry methods to ultra-sensitive immunoassays.

He has published more than 200 original research articles in field of fluid biomarkers. Dr. Ashton was awarded the Queen of Sweden Prize to a Young Alzheimer Researcher for his contribution dementia research in 2021. In addition, he received the Viola Bergqvist award for mentorship in 2022. At the age of 36, Dr. Ashton was listed amongst the world’s most highly cited researchers and again the following year (Clarivate 2023 and 2024).

Dr. Rhoda Au is Professor of Anatomy & Neurobiology, Neurology and Epidemiology at Boston University, and is a Senior Fellow at the Institute for Health Systems Innovation and Policy at the Questrom School of Business. She also serves as Director of Neuropsychology at the Framingham Heart Study.

Dr. Au has been developing a multi-sensory brain health monitoring platform that is customizable, technology agnostic, and scalable. Her objectives include transitioning the platform from reliance on high friction technologies to low friction ones and developing broad based data sharing resources to accelerate data science/AI driven discovery of digital biomarkers. Her research seeks to move the primary focus of health technologies from precision Alzheimer’s medicine to a broader emphasis on precision brain health.

Dr. David Berron is a cognitive neuroscientist and Research Group Leader at the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) in Magdeburg, Germany. His research focuses on developing digital and neuroimaging biomarkers to detect and monitor cognitive decline in neurodegenerative diseases. Using high-resolution structural and functional MRI, he investigates the functional architecture of memory, as well as the impact of Alzheimer’s disease pathology on brain function. His work integrates remote and unsupervised digital cognitive assessments via smartphones and tablets, with the goal of enhancing early diagnosis, prognosis and personalized monitoring as well as clinical trial strategies for Alzheimer’s disease by combining novel biomarkers with digital assessments.

As co-founder and Chief Science Officer of neotiv GmbH, Dr. Berron translates cutting-edge research into digital tools for remote and unsupervised cognitive assessment.

Dr. Berron holds a degree in psychology from the University of Bremen and a PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience from Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg. He completed postdoctoral research at Lund University, where he remains an affiliated researcher with the Clinical Memory Research Unit and the Swedish BioFINDER study. He is active in several international research initiatives and leads the JPND expert group on Remote Cognitive Assessment and Monitoring in Alzheimer’s Disease (REMOTE-AD).

Dr. Joel Braunstein is Co-Founder and CEO of C₂N Diagnostics and has led the company's growth and commercial efforts since its inception. Dr. Braunstein has played a senior executive role in numerous emerging life sciences companies since 2004. He received his M.D. with Highest Distinction from Northwestern University Medical School in 1996. Subsequently, he trained in internal medicine at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and was a Fellow in Cardiovascular Medicine and Robert Wood Johnson National Clinical Scholar at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. Additionally, he completed an MBA with management and health policy focus and maintained an Assistant Professorship in Cardiology at Johns Hopkins University. In 2010, he was named a Distinguished Alumnus of Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. Jeffrey Cummings is globally known for his contributions to Alzheimer’s research, drug development, and clinical trials. He has been recognized for his research and leadership contributions in the field of Alzheimer’s disease through many awards including the Ronald and Nancy Reagan Research Award of the national Alzheimer’s Association (2008), Lifetime Achievement Award of the Society for Behavioral and Cognitive Neurology (2017), Distinguished Scientist Award of the American Association of Geriatric Psychiatry (2010), Bengt Winblad Lifetime Achievement Award from the national Alzheimer’s Association (2019), and the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation’s Melvin R. Goodes Prize. He was featured in the Gentleman’s Quarterly (June 2009) as a “Rock Star of Science™.” Dr. Cummings completed Neurology residency and a Fellowship in Behavioral Neurology at Boston University, followed by a Research Fellowship in Neuropathology and Neuropsychiatry at the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases, Queen Square, London. Dr. Cummings was formerly Director of the Mary S. Easton Center for Alzheimer’s Disease Research at UCLA, and Director of the Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health. Dr. Cummings’ interests embrace clinical trials, developing new therapies for brain diseases, and the interface of neuroscience and society. He has authored or edited 43 books and published over 800 peer-reviewed papers.

Dr. Howard Fillit is a geriatrician, neuroscientist, and innovative philanthropy executive, who has led the ADDF since its founding. Dr. Fillit has held faculty positions at The Rockefeller University, the SUNY-Stony Brook School of Medicine and the Cornell University School of Medicine. In 1987, he joined the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, where he is a clinical professor of geriatric medicine and palliative care, medicine and neuroscience. Dr. Fillit also maintains a limited private practice in consultative geriatric medicine with a focus on Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias.

He has authored or co-authored more than 300 publications and is the senior editor of Brocklehurst’s Textbook of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology. Dr. Fillit is the recipient of many awards and honors including the Rita Hayworth Award from the Alzheimer’s Association. He is a fellow of the American Geriatrics Society, the American College of Physicians, the Gerontological Society of America and the New York Academy of Medicine. Dr. Fillit earned his bachelor of arts in neurobiology cum laude from Cornell University and his medical degree from the SUNY-Upstate Medical University.

Dr. Graham received her PhD in Neuroscience from Baylor University. After her doctoral training, she completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, TX characterizing the role of BNDF and CREB in the mesolimbic DA system in neuropsychiatric illness. Dr. Graham moved to Boston MA in 2007 to join the Neurobiology department at Merck Research Labs. As a research biologist at Merck, she contributed to the early-stage drug discovery pipeline through the development of novel pharmacodynamic and efficacy models of CNS Disease. In 2009, she moved to EMD Serono, and joined the Translational Neuropharmacology group. At EMD Serono, she was responsible for leading a team of scientists in the characterization of novel therapeutics and biomarker endpoints for AD, PD, and MS. In 2014, she moved to Biogen and joined the Translational Sciences group at Biogen where she has had roles with increasing responsibility over the years. At present, Dr. Graham is Vice President, Head of Biomarkers and Systems Biology at Biogen. In this role, Dr. Graham and her team leverage human-based evidence to support target identification and validation, along with the identification, implementation, and interpretation of novel biomarker and bioanalytical measures to support clinical programs across the Biogen pipeline. Dr. Graham and her team are heavily involved in assay development and data generation on novel plasma biomarkers in Alzheimer’s disease with a specific focus on patient screening/selection tools for clinical trials and blood-based tools to enable treatment monitoring.

Dr. Oskar Hansson gained his PhD in neurobiology in 2001 and his M.D. in 2005. He became senior consultant in neurology in 2012 at Skåne University Hospital, full professor of neurology in 2017 at Lund University, and vice president in 2024 at Eli Lilly. Oskar Hansson performs internationally recognized clinical and translational research focusing on the early phases of Alzheimer's and Parkinson’s diseases. His work on biomarkers has led to over 400 original peer-reviewed publications. He heads the prospective and longitudinal Swedish BioFINDER studies (www.biofinder.se), where the research team focuses on the development of optimized diagnostic algorithms for early diagnosis, and also studies the consequences of different brain pathologies on cognitive, neurologic and psychiatric symptoms in healthy individuals and patients with dementia and parkinsonian disorders. Recently, the BioFINDER team has shown that Tau PET imaging can with high accuracy distinguish Alzheimer’s from all other neurodegenerative diseases (JAMA, 2018), predict cognitive decline in cognitively normal individuals (Nature Medicine, 2022), and to detect different subtypes of Alzheimer’s (Nature Medicine 2021). He has also developed and validated blood-based biomarkers for early detection of Alzheimer’s disease (Nature Medicine, 2020; JAMA, 2020, Nature Aging 2021, Nature Medicine 2021, Nature Medicine 2022, Nature Medicine 2024, JAMA 2024, Nature Medicine 2025) and markers for Lewy body disease (Nature Medicine 2023, Nature Medicine 2023).

Dr. Cecilia Lee is a Professor and Klorfine Family Chair of Ophthalmology at University of Washington in Seattle, WA. She specializes in medical retina and uveitis serves as the Director of Clinical Research at the Department of Ophthalmology. Dr. Lee’s research interests include Big Data, clinical epidemiology, ophthalmic imaging, and retinal biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease. She co-leads UW Computational Ophthalmology Lab with primary focus on machine learning/Big Data research in transdisciplinary fields such as ophthalmic imaging, neuroradiology, and neuropathology.  

Dr. Lee received NIH/NEI K23 Career Development Award and has several NIH funded grants. She serves as the principal investigator of Eye Adult Changes in Thought (ACT) study, a prospective, longitudinal community-based cohort that is followed with visual function tests and multiple retinal imaging biennially until the development of dementia. She has received funding from the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation’s (ADDF) Diagnostic Accelerator (DxA) program. In addition, Dr. Lee serves as the Program Director of Artificial Intelligence Ready and Equitable Atlas for Diabetes Insights (AI-READI) project with the goal of generating a flagship AI-ready dataset to support future AI-driven discoveries in Type 2 diabetes as part of the NIH Bridge2AI Program. Dr. Lee aspires to leverage large datasets to study and gain novel insights of prevalent health conditions through next generation Big Data and machine learning approaches.

Dr. Melissa Lee is Assistant Director of the Diagnostics Accelerator at the Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation, where she manages the DxA's digital and ocular biomarker portfolios and leads the science for SpeechDx. Her work at the ADDF focuses on scientific strategy, partnership development, and AI and digital biomarker innovation.

Prior to the ADDF, Melissa spent 13 years as a lab research scientist, completing her PhD at Columbia University, where she studied glial cells in autism and brain development under Drs. Carol Mason and Mimi Shirasu-Hiza. She has co-authored 6 publications including in Neuron and the Journal of Neuroscience, as well as a chapter on the eye-to-brain connection in the 12th edition of Adler's Physiology of the Eye.

Dr Luo is an innovator and serial entrepreneur and has spent his entire career building life science startup companies. Dr Luo is currently the Founder, Chairman and CEO of Alamar Biosciences, a company reinventing immunoassays to enable ultra-sensitive and highly multiplexed liquid biopsy analysis for the early detection of diseases. Dr Luo was the inventor of RNAscope, a breakthrough molecular detection technology that has pioneered spatial biology and become the gold standard in RNA tissue imaging. As the Founder, President and CEO of Advanced Cell Diagnostics (ACD), he led the company from concept to successful product launch and commercialization. Under his leadership, ACD became one of the fastest growing life science companies, and was acquired by Bio-Techne in 2016. Before ACD, Dr Luo was a co-founder of Panomics (p/k/a Genospectra), a life science company that was acquired by Affymetrix in 2008. At Panomics, he served in various roles including Vice President, Functional Genomics and Chief Scientific Officer and led the development and launch of all its flagship products. Prior to Panomics, Dr. Luo was one of the earliest senior scientists at Exelixis, now a NASDAQ company, where he led a team to identify and validate novel therapeutic targets. Dr Luo also co-founded and served as Chairman of the board of Avida Biomed, an NGS-based liquid biopsy technology company that was acquired by Agilent in 2022. Dr Luo is a Venture Partner of Illumina Ventures. Dr Luo has published numerous research papers in top peer-reviewed journals. His inventions are the subject of over 30 issued patents. Dr Luo received a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Science & Technology of China and earned a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Case Western Reserve University.

Xiao-Jun joined Alamar Biosciences in June of 2021 as Chief Technology Officer. Xiao-Jun is a successful R&D leader with more than 20 years of experience in the life sciences and molecular diagnostics industries. Most recently he served as Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer in the Genomics Division of Bio-Techne, a pioneer in spatial genomics since its inception as Advanced Cell Diagnostics (ACD). During his 11-year tenure at ACD, Xiao-Jun led the development of a world-leading portfolio of in situ RNA and DNA detection solutions for the research and clinical diagnostics markets. Prior to joining ACD, he was Vice President of R&D/Biostatistics in bioTheranostics (formerly AviaraDx and Arcturus Bioscience and recently acquired by Hologic, Inc.). Prior to bioTheranostics, Xiao-Jun held senior bioinformatics positions at Johnson & Johnson and Monsanto/Searle (Pfizer), where he applied his multi-disciplinary knowledge in molecular biology and bioinformatics to discover novel drug targets and biomarkers. Xiao-Jun received his doctorate training in biochemistry at Case Western Reserve University and the University of Iowa and post-doctoral training in molecular genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Mark A. Mintun, MD has led Lilly’s Pain and Neurodegeneration research and development since January of 2018 and assumed his current position over Neuroscience R&D in 2021. In 2010, Dr. Mintun joined Avid Radiopharmaceuticals, now a wholly owned subsidiary of Eli Lilly & Co., as Chief Medical Officer and became its President in 2014. Prior to Avid, Dr. Mintun was Professor and Vice-Chair of Radiology at the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology at the Washington University School of Medicine, with joint appointments in Psychiatry, Neurology, Bioengineering, and the Anatomy and Neurobiology Departments. He earned a BS in Chemical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1977, received his medical degree in 1981 at Washington University School of Medicine and completed a research fellowship in neurology and residency training in nuclear medicine. Dr. Mintun has co-authored over 200 research publications that include reports of brain imaging to characterize flow/metabolism relationships, neurotransmitter systems, circuitry for processing affective stimuli and the pathology of neurodegenerative diseases. After joining Avid he led development programs for both amyloid and tau imaging of patients with neurodegenerative diseases. More recently he has overseen Lilly’s extensive neuroscience research and development programs for Alzheimer disease, Parkinson disease and Chronic Pain conditions.

Dr. Laura Nisenbaum is a proven scientific leader with 30 years of biotechnology industry and academia experience. At the ADDF, she oversees the Scientific Affairs, Biomarker Development, and Aging and Alzheimer’s Prevention teams.

Most recently, Dr. Nisenbaum served as Senior Director of Aducanumab Biomarkers and Diagnostic Pathways at Biogen, where she led the biomarker strategy for Aducanumab, as well as the Diagnostics Pathway group within the Biomarker Organization.

Her time at Biogen followed 20 years of experience at Eli Lilly and Company where she served as Asset Manager for Chorus, an autonomous early-phase clinical development organization within Lilly. Dr. Nisenbaum also served as Research Fellow and neuroscience lead in tailored therapeutics, translational medicine, and preclinical drug discovery.

Prior to joining the biotechnology field, Dr. Nisenbaum received a Fulbright Scholarship to study in Cologne, Germany. She then completed her PhD in neuroscience in 1991 at the University of Pittsburgh and transitioned to industry after completing postdoctoral training at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the University of Tennessee College of Medicine, and a faculty position in Physiology and Neurobiology at the University of Connecticut.

Throughout her career, Dr. Nisenbaum has contributed to the discovery and development of more than 15 novel therapeutics, bringing three molecules for FDA approval. She has also authored over 35 publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals.

Mark Roithmayr is an admired nonprofit leader with four decades of experience in both start-ups and mature organizations. At the ADDF, Mr. Roithmayr is responsible for steering the Foundation’s overall strategy, focus, and business operations. Since joining the ADDF in 2017, the organization has transformed dramatically in impact, scale, presence, and brand. Under his leadership, the ADDF’s revenue has increased five-fold from $17M to an excess of $90M and mission related investing has grown over 100%.

As such, Mr. Roithmayr sets the strategic vision of the ADDF and works in partnership with the Co-Founder and CSO, Howard Fillit, MD, Executive Leadership, and the Board of Governors and Overseers to advance and execute the Foundation’s mission of accelerating the discovery of drugs to prevent, treat, and cure Alzeimer’s disease and related dementias. His areas of expertise and focus include venture philanthropy, strategic planning, volunteer development, and brand-building. One of Mr. Roithmayr’s milestone accomplishments was securing Bill Gates, as well as Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Scott, as donors to further the Foundation’s venture philanthropy efforts. Additionally, he secured a 10-figure gift from the families of Leonard and Ronald Lauder, ensuring all overhead costs will be covered at the ADDF for the next two decades.

Prior to joining the ADDF, Mr. Roithmayr was Chief Relationship Officer at the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. There, he helped launch its venture philanthropy initiative, directed its 56 national chapters, and led annual fundraising of over $200 million. Prior his time at the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, he served for seven years as president of Autism Speaks. As that organization’s first president, he shepherded its growth from a start-up into the world’s largest autism research and advocacy organization. Earlier in his career, Mr. Roithmayr held several executive positions, spanning two decades, with the March of Dimes. He earned a bachelor’s degree in communications at Rowan University.

Dr. Pallavi Sachdev is the Executive Director and Head of Translational Medicine at Eisai Inc. She earned her Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Mount Sinai-New York University School of Medicine and completed her postdoctoral fellowship at The Rockefeller University, focusing on cell signaling networks. Recognized as a subject matter expert in the implementation of clinical biomarkers for Precision Therapeutics in both neurology and oncology, Dr. Sachdev leverages a 4R-driven biomarker strategy to optimize clinical trial outcomes and drive successful drug development.In recognition of her noteworthy achievements, Dr. Sachdev received the 2021 Rising Star Award from the Healthcare Businesswoman’s Association (HBA). Her research interests include the application of multiple biomarker modalities, combining fluid-based biomarkers with imaging, genetic, and digital modalities, with a focus on Alzheimer’s disease. Within her group, she has expanded the use of global proteomics to deliver target engagement and treatment response biomarkers for the diverse neurology pipeline.Dr. Sachdev is a champion of pre-competitive collaboration and is an active member of several public/private partnerships and consortia, including DIAN-TU, ADNI PPSB, FNIH AMP-AD, and the CORAL consortium.