Dr. Ghobrial received her MD in 1995 from Cairo University School of Medicine, Egypt. She completed her Internal Medicine training at Wayne State University, Mich., and her Hematology/Oncology subspecialty training at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, Minn. She joined Dana-Farber in the field of Waldenstrom's macroglobulinemia and multiple myeloma in 2005. She is conducting research in the area of homing and migration of B cells and novel therapeutic agents in Waldenstrom's macroglbulinemia and multiple myeloma.

James J. Driscoll, MD, PhD received his B.A. in Biology and PhD in Biochemistry from the State University of New York at Buffalo. He then completed his MD degree, served as an intern and resident in Internal Medicine (Boston University Medical Center) and completed training in the Combined Hematology and Oncology Fellowship Program at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, MD. Dr. Driscoll has also pursued a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School and the Veterans Affairs Boston Healthcare System investigating the role of the ubiquitin+proteasome system in multiple myeloma. He joined the Division of Hematology & Oncology at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine in 2011 as an Assistant Professor. The focus of his research has been understanding the molecular mechanisms responsible for resistance to proteasome inhibitors as well as the genetic bases for patient response to proteasome inhibitors. In addition to his laboratory interests, Dr. Driscoll teaches graduate students and Hematology & Oncology Fellows on the faculty of the University of Cincinnati Medical School. He was recently selected to serve on NIH Study Sections, the American Society of Hematology Advocacy Leadership Institute and the Multiple Myeloma Think Tank for the Integration of Novel Targets for Therapy.

Dr. Martha Lacy is the Chair of Hematology and Professor of Medicine at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. Dr. Lacy is from Colorado and completed both her undergraduate and medical degrees at the University of Colorado. She did her residency in internal medicine in Spokane Washington and then did fellowship training in Hematology/Oncology at Mayo Clinic. She joined the staff of Mayo Clinic in 1995. She is a member of the Myeloma, Amyloidosis, and Dysproteinemia Disease Oriented Group (MAD DOG) and the bone marrow transplant group at Mayo. She is active in clinical research and has been the principal investigator of numerous clinical trials in myeloma. Her current research interests center on immune directed therapies for myeloma. She has been PI for trials utilizing dendritic cells, cytokines, IMIDs (pomalidomide) and is currently working on trials for virotherapy for myeloma.

Saad Zafar Usmani, M.D., FACP is the Director of Plasma Cell Disorder program and the Director of Clinical Research in Hematologic Malignancies at the Levine Cancer Institute/Carolinas Healthcare System in July 2013. He is an internationally recognized clinical and translational researcher focused on plasma cell disorders in general, and high-risk multiple myeloma in specific. He is a specialist in Hematology, Medical Oncology and Bone Marrow Transplantation. He also holds an academic appointment as Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine at the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Medicine. Dr. Usmani received his medical education at Allama Iqbal Medical College Lahore, Pakistan. He completed a residency in Internal Medicine at Sinai-Grace Hospital/Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, and a fellowship in Hematology & Oncology at the University of Connecticut Health Center in Farmington, Connecticut. Prior to joining Levine Cancer Institute, Dr. Usmani was an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, AR where he served as the Director of Developmental Therapeutics at the Myeloma Institute for Research & Therapy. He is a member of the International Myeloma Working Group, the SWOG Myeloma Committee, the American Society of Hematology, the American Society of Clinical Oncology and the American Society of Bone Marrow Transplantation. He is also serving on the ASCO Scientific Committee on Lymphoma and Plasma Cell Disorders, the ASH Committee on Plasma Cell Neoplasia, and the NCI Myeloma Steering Committee. He is on the editorial review board of numerous medical journals, has authored/co-authored over 70 peer-reviewed manuscripts, and over 90 abstracts at national and international meetings.

My research interest lies in the field of tumor immunotherapy and its incorporation into bone marrow transplantation. Active projects include the development of dendritic cell tumor fusions to be used as tumor vaccines in a clinical trial for patients with breast cancer now in progression. I have also been exploring the number of immune reconstitution post-transplant and studying the impact of cytokine therapy with IL-12 and GM-CSF on this process. I am currently leading a new trial in the use of post-transplant Her2Neu antibody therapy assessing its impact on persistent residual disease. One group is investigating novel approaches to allogeneic transplantation including the use of non-myeloablative approaches.

Dr. Giada Bianchi is a senior fellow in the Hematologic Neoplasia division and a researcher in the LeBow Institute for Myeloma Therapeutics/Jerome Lipper Multiple Myeloma Center at Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, MA. She received her medical degree at the “Vita-Salute” San Raffaele University in Milan, Italy, with a thesis on the molecular mechanisms underlying sensitivity of multiple myeloma cells to proteasome inhibitors. She accomplished further research training with Alfred L. Goldberg, PhD, at the Harvard Medical School, and Kenneth C. Anderson, MD, at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA. Dr. Bianchi graduated from the Internal Medicine Residency program at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, where she pursued clinical and translational research in multiple myeloma with Vincent S. Rajkumar, MD, and Shaji Kumar, MD, respectively. She then completed a fellowship in Hematology/Oncology at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute/Partners where she is anticipated to join the staff shortly. Dr. Bianchi’s research focuses on the molecular mechanisms underlying the transformation of premalignant plasma cell dyscrasia, monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) and smoldering multiple myeloma (SMM), into active multiple myeloma. In her short career, she authored over 20 articles and 4 book chapters in the field of multiple myeloma. She is the recipient of the Friends of Dana Farber’s Fellow Award, 2013; the Janock Fellow Award, 2014, the Kenneth Anderson Award in Hematologic Oncology, 2015 and the American Society of Hematology (ASH) Research Training Award for Fellows, 2015.

The research of Shaji Kumar, M.D., focuses on development of novel drugs for treatment of myeloma. Dr. Kumar's research team evaluates the in vitro activity of novel drugs that, based on their mechanisms of action, are likely to have activity in the setting of myeloma. Promising drugs are brought into the clinic through early-stage clinical trials in Phase I or II studies. Dr. Kumar also evaluates novel combinations of different drugs to identify synergistic combinations that can result in better treatment responses and eventually better patient outcomes. His work on drug development is complemented by an active program studying the biology of myeloma, with a focus on the study of bone marrow microenvironment in multiple myeloma and how it influences the tumor cells, especially the increased bone marrow microvessels seen in myeloma. His clinical research focuses on outcomes of patients with myeloma and amyloidosis, especially high-risk disease.

Constantine Mitsiades, MD, PhD is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Assistant Professor in Medicine in Medical Oncology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Dr Mitsiades has published over 100 articles in peer reviewed journals. He has many years of experience in the field of multiple myeloma and the role of the tumor microenvironment.