Invited Speaker

DAMIJAN MIKLAVCIC

University of Ljubljana

Title of Presentation: Electroporation: ablation, drug, and gene delivery tool

Damijan Miklavcic is a tenured professor at University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Electrical Engineering. He is a world-leading expert in the field of electroporation. Over the past 30 years, he has made significant contributions to advancing the understanding of electroporation on membrane, cell and tissue level. His research spans basic science, demonstrating improved efficacy of selected cancer drugs by electroporation on preclinical level, as well as applied engineering, including the development of electrodes and devices, and the use of computational modelling for treatment planning. He has played a major role in the development of irreversible electroporation for cardiac ablation (i.e. Pulsed Field Ablation), which holds great promise and lends itself as a game changer in cardiac electrophysiology. Additionally, he is actively developing DNA delivery methods using electroporation for cell- and gene-based therapies.

Damijan Miklav膷i膷 was the main proposer and chair of the COST TD1104 Action (2011-2016), which united the majority of research groups in the field of electroporation and culminated in the first World Congress on Electroporation in 2015, now held biennially. He is a founding member and served as the first elected president of the International Society of Electroporation-Based Technologies and Treatments. He is the editor of the Handbook of Electroporation, a comprehensive reference comprising 2998 pages and 156 chapters. He has reviewed for more than 70 journals and has served on editorial boards of Radiology and Oncology, Bioelectrochemistry, associate editor IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering (TMBE), IEEE Transactions on Nanobioscience, and Bioelectromagnetics. He is listed inventor in 14 international patents and has published over 500 peer-reviewed research papers. According to Google Scholar, his works has been cited more than 35.000 times, with an h-index of 103.

Personal web page:

Session Keynote

Lisbet Haglund. PhD

Dr. Haglund completed her doctoral degree in cell and molecular biology at Lund University Sweden followed by post-doctoral studies at the Shriners Hospital for Children in Montreal, QC, Canada. She joined the Department of Surgery, Division of Orthopaedics as Assistant Professor in 2009 and is now tenured full Professor.听

Her expertise is in musculoskeletal research spanning from tissue injury, degeneration and inflammation to regenerative medicine. She is leading a multi-disciplinary鈥痶eam that develops novel approaches for diagnosis and treatment of spinal pathologies. Current projects focus on translational research in intervertebral disc degeneration and associated pain, and in novel approaches to spine reconstruction.听

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Trafford Crump, PhD

Title: "Patient reported outcomes in surgery"

Dr. Trafford Crump holds the Jarislowsky Foundation Chair in Thoracic Surgery at 韩国裸舞鈥檚 Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences. He is a health services 鈥俽esearcher with a focus on surgery and surgical oncology. He leads a research program focused on improving patient-centeredness and the value of surgical care. Through this program, he has developed an expertise in the collection, analyses, and interpretation of patient-reported end points, including treatment preferences, outcomes, and experiences. Dr. Crump trained at the Centre for Health Services and Policy Research at the University of British Columbia and received a Ph.D. in the evaluative clinical sciences from Dartmouth College.

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Dr.听Anthony Bozzo,听M.D., M.Sc., FRCSC听

Title: "Multimodal AI to improve the outcomes of sarcoma patients"

Dr. Anthony Bozzo is an Assistant Professor in Orthopedic Surgery at 韩国裸舞 and is appointed as a Junior Scientist at the Research Institute of the MUHC. He completed both a clinical fellowship in orthopedic oncology and a research fellowship at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, under the supervision of Dr John Healey. Dr. Bozzo completed his residency in Orthopedic Surgery at McMaster University where he also earned a MSc under the supervision of his mentor Dr Michelle Ghert, the first orthopedic oncologist to lead international randomized trials. In addition to a clinical practice involving complex sarcoma resections and surgical treatment of patients with metastatic bone disease, Dr. Bozzo is leading multiple projects leveraging the power of multimodal neural network models. Dr Bozzo and his team published the first multimodal deep neural network in sarcoma in NPJ Precision Oncology in 2024 and are developing a playbook to assist other institutions with collaborative multimodal AI studies. The playbook is available at sarcomaAIhub.com. By using AI, Dr. Bozzo and his collaborators aim to improve the care and outcomes of sarcoma patients. Dr. Bozzo is currently enrolled in a PhD in Experimental Surgery at 韩国裸舞 where he is furthering his work on applying AI to helping sarcoma patients. He is grateful and blessed to be taking care of orthopedic oncology patients in his home town of Montreal and home province of Quebec.

Date: May 16, 2025

Location:Livingston Hall, Montreal General Hospital, L6

Abstract Reviewers

• Dr. Amani Hassan (Postdoc)
• Dr. Anie Philip (PI)
• Dr. David Labb茅 (PI)
• Dr. Geoffroy Danieau (Postdoc)
• Dr. Joanna Przybyl (PI)
• Dr. Lisbet Haglund (PI)
• Dr. Maria Petropavlovskaya (PI)
• Dr. Nicoletta Eliopoulos (PI)
• Dr. Rahul Gawri (PI)
• Dr. Renzo Cecere (PI)
• Dr. Richard Miallot (Postdoc)
• Dr. Wassim Kassouf (PI)
• Muskan Alad (PhD Candidate)
• Pegah Rahimizadeh (PhD Candidate)

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The Research Day Organizing Committee:

• Dr. Fackson Mwale, Professor and Graduate Program Director
• Dr. Jake Barralet, SIS Associate Program Leader
• Muskan Alad, PhD student, Vice-President Academic Experimental Surgery Graduate Student Society
• Pegah Rahimizadeh, PhD student, Experimental Surgery Graduate Student Society
• Micha Huynh, SIS Program Administrator
• Sharon Turner, SIS Graduate Program Coordinator
• Laura Epure, MSc Eng., SIS Administrative and Student Affairs Coordinator
• Anne Mathiot, SIS Program Manager MUHC
• Janae Palmer, SIS Program Assistant MUHC
• Terry Ng Wan, Chief Multimedia Technician

If you have any questions regarding the event, please contact Ms. Sharon Turner at gradstudies.surgery [at] mcgill.ca