Marisa Bartolomei is the Perelman Professor of Cell & Developmental Biology, Director of the Center for Women’s Health and Reproductive Medicine and co-Director of the Epigenetics Institute at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. She received her BS from the University of Maryland and PhD from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She subsequently trained as a postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Shirley Tilghman at Princeton University. In 1993, Dr. Bartolomei was appointed as an Assistant Professor at the University of Pennsylvania rising to Professor in 2006. Dr. Bartolomei received the 2006 Society for Women's Health Research Medtronics Prize for Contributions to Women's Health. In 2011, Dr. Bartolomei received the Jane Glick Graduate School Teaching Award for the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and an NIH MERIT award. She was elected as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2014. Dr. Bartolomei is the recipient of the 2017 Genetics Society Medal (UK Genetics Society), 2022 Society for the Study of Reproduction Research Award and is a Member of National Academy of Sciences. She also received the 2024 March of Dimes Richard B. Johnston, Jr. MD Prize. Dr. Bartolomei’s research addresses the epigenetic mechanisms of genomic imprinting and germline reprogramming, as well as the impact of early developmental environmental insults on epigenetic gene regulation using the mouse as a model.

Originally from the USA, Maxim Greenberg completed his PhD at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) in Steve Jacobsen's laboratory, where he studied DNA methylation mechanisms in the plant Arabidopsis thaliana. There he utilized genetic and biochemical techniques to characterize factors in the small RNA-directed DNA methylation pathway. In 2012, he joined the lab of Deborah Bourc'his at the Institut Curie in Paris as an EMBO post-doctoral fellow. He continued his research in the field of DNA methylation, but now in the context of mouse development. More specifically, he was interested in the potential of epigenetic memory of DNA methylation established in the early embryo to persist throughout life. He was recruited to the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) as a Tenured Researcher in 2017. Max then joined the Institut Jacques Monod in 2019, where he is set up his independent research program in mammalian epigenetics with an ERC starting grant. The Greenberg lab uses cutting-edge genomic and (epi)genome editing techniques to explore non-canonical modes of DNA methylation-mediated regulation in mammals.

Maria Aristizabal is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biology and a cross-appointed faculty in the Department of Biomedical and Molecular Sciences at Queen’s University. Work in her laboratory is funded by Queen’s, NSERC, the Cancer Research Society, the Canadian Cancer Society, and the New Frontiers in Research Fund.

Maria completed a PhD in Genetics from the University of British Columbia under the supervision of Dr. Michael Kobor followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of British Columbia and the University of Toronto co-supervised by Dr. Kobor and Dr. Marla Sokolowski. Throughout her degree, Maria earned prestigious awards, including a Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Award from CIHR, an NSERC postdoctoral fellowship for which she was the top ranked female candidate in the Cellular and Molecular Biology competition, a CIFAR postdoctoral fellowship, and was named a Jacobs Foundation Young Scholar. Maria is a highly collaborative interdisciplinary researcher whose work aims to understand the mechanics of genome function. Her research has contributed to our understanding of transcription regulation, epigenetics, and DNA integrity.

Julie Brind'Amour is an Associate professor, Université de Montréal. Julie's lab uses a combination of molecular biology, genomic sequencing and bioinformatics analysis tools to answer questions related to the transition from the maternal epigenome to that of the embryo. Her research interests focus on the process of epigenetic reprogramming in germ cells and early embryos in mammals. In particular, her lab is interested in the effect of different interventions or mutations on the establishment of the maternal epigenome, as well as their resulting effects on transcriptional control in the embryo.

X-chromosome inactivation occurs early during mammalian development to transcriptionally silence one of the pair of X chromosomes in females, thereby achieving dosage equivalence with males who have a single X chromosome and the sex-determining Y chromosome. X chromosome inactivation results in mosaicism within females for which X chromosome is inactive - as seen in a calico cat. Professor Brown has studied X inactivation for over 35 years. During her graduate studies with Dr. HF Willard (at University of Toronto and Stanford) she discovered the XIST gene, the long non-coding RNA that initiates the silencing of the X chromosome. After postdoc studies with Dr. Willard (Stanford and Case Western Reserve University) she started her lab at UBC in 1994. The Brown lab studies the role of XIST in the initiation and maintenance of X inactivation and also, in collaboration with the E.M. Simpson and W.W. Wasserman labs, how many genes in humans ‘escape’ inactivation and get expressed from the inactive X, potentially contributing to sex differences.

Özgen received her undergraduate degree in Molecular Biology and Genetics from Middle East Technical University (Ankara, Turkey) and MSc degree in Molecular and Cellular Biology from Ruprecht Karls University (Heidelberg, Germany). She obtained her PhD in 2014 with Professor Modesto Orozco from Barcelona University, working on nucleosome positioning and its dynamics throughout cell cycle in budding yeast. She then joined Dr Miguel Branco’s group at Queen Mary University of London for her postdoctoral training to investigate the epigenetic regulation of transposons in early development and cancer. During this time, she demonstrated the first examples of transposons that can act as oncogenic enhancers in leukaemia. After her postdoc, she joined Imperial College London as a Research Fellow to establish her own research programme, co-funded by AstraZeneca. At the end of 2022, Özgen was awarded a Cancer Research UK Career Development Fellowship and joined the Barts Cancer Institute, Queen Mary University of London as a group leader and lecturer. Her research group focuses on the epigenetic regulation of transposable elements and how their dysregulation contributes to the generation and development of cancer. Using an integrative approach, combining functional and computational genomics, the team investigates their roles as gene regulators and as triggers of anti-tumour immunity in cancer.

Dr. Gaiti is an early career investigator at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network, and Assistant Professor in the Dept. of Medical Biophysics at the University of Toronto, where he started his faculty appointment on September 2021. Dr. Gaiti earned his PhD in evolutionary biology and genomics from the University of Queensland (Australia), where he focused on understanding the evolutionary origin of two major players in human gene regulation: long non-coding RNAs and chromatin marks. Through these studies, he developed a deep interest in understanding how a single normal cell becomes malignant by the accumulation of genetic and non-genetic alterations. This motivated him to pursue a career in biomedical research, to understand the underpinnings of evolutionary plasticity of cancer. As a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Dan Landau’s laboratory at Weill Cornell Medicine and New York Genome Center, he made contributions to the cancer genomics and computational oncology fields by examining the epigenetic dimension of cancer evolution, using chronic lymphocytic leukemia and human gliomas as models. Dr. Gaiti is an emerging leader in computational oncology who, over the past years, has published 23 papers that have generated over 1500 citations in highly esteemed journals including Nature, Nature Genetics, Science, and Cell Stem Cell. His studies have been recognized by prestigious fellowships, grants, and awards. Dr. Gaiti runs a research lab with the focus on studying evolutionary plasticity of cancer, specifically understanding drivers of normal cell malignant transformation and tumor evolution through state-of-the-art and innovative single cell multi-omic experimental and computational approaches. Dr. Gaiti is committed to a career in basic cancer research with translational impact, making discoveries that would offer improved therapeutic options to directly address cancer evolution.

David Gosselin completed his doctorate in physiology-endocrinology at Laval University in May 2012. His studies, conducted under the supervision of Dr. Serge Rivest, focused on understanding the role of pro-inflammatory cytokine interleukin-1 beta in regulating neuronal activity in various brain-related pathologies. He then completed, from July 2012 to March 2017, a postdoctoral fellowship in epigenomics under the direction of Dr. Christopher Glass at the University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego), where he gained a better understanding of the molecular mechanisms that regulate transcription in human and murine microglia (see Gosselin et al., Cell, 2014, Gosselin et al., Science, 2017). Finally, since April 2017, He is an Assistant Professor at Laval University, where is laboratory, located at the CHU of Quebec-Laval University Research Centre, aims to better understand the role of microglia in brain physiology.

Dr. Courtney Hanna finished her PhD in 2013 in Dr. Wendy Robinson’s lab at University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. She then moved to Dr. Gavin Kelsey’s group as a postdoctoral fellow at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, UK. In 2018, Courtney received a Next Generation Fellowship from the Centre for Trophoblast Research. And in 2021, she received a Wellcome Trust and Royal Society Sir Henry Dale Fellowship to start her lab in the Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience, University of Cambridge. Her research involves utilising multi-omics and embryology techniques to understand the mechanisms of epigenetic regulation in placental development.

Dr. Hirst is a Distinguished Scientist and Head of Epigenomics at Canada’s Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre at BC Cancer, Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology and Director of the Michael Smith Laboratory at the University of British Columbia (UBC).

His research focuses on understanding epigenetic dysfunction in cancer and his laboratory develops experimental and computational tools to characterize normal and transformed cell types down to the single cell level. He applies these tools to explore the epigenomic states of normal and transformed cell types to discover and exploit therapeutic vulnerabilities.

Over the last decade, he has led the development of an internationally recognized epigenomic research program at BC Cancer and UBC. He leads the Centre of Epigenomic Mapping Technologies (CEMT) that represents one of two Canadian epigenomic mapping centres funded as part of the CIHR signature initiative: the Canadian Epigenetics, Environment and Health Research Consortium (CEEHRC). Dr. Hirst chairs the Scientific Steering Committee of the International Human Epigenome Consortium (ihec.org) and leads the Canadian Epigenetics, Environment and Health Research Consortium Network (epigenomes.ca) with a mandate to drive epigenetic research in Canada and internationally.

Dr. Arturas Petronis is a senior scientist with Molecular Science and head of the Krembil Family Epigenetics Laboratory at CAMH. He is also a professor in the psychiatry and pharmacology departments and Tapscott Chair in Schizophrenia Studies, University of Toronto.

Dr. Petronis has launched a comprehensive epigenetics research program in the Krembil Family Epigenetics Laboratory. This section is developing new techniques and tools to search the entire genome for gene modifications that have been identified as epigenetic risk factors. These factors are believed to play a role in the manifestation of psychiatric and other illnesses, in addition to genetic and environmental influences. Epigenetics research shows that regulation of gene activity is critically important for normal functioning of the genome. The technology may help to identify the causes of complex diseases such as schizophrenia, diabetes, and cancer, and open new avenues for developing novel diagnostic and therapeutic approaches.

Jacquetta Trasler is a Distinguished James McGill Professor in the Departments of Pediatrics, Human Genetics and Pharmacology & Therapeutics at McGill University and a Senior Scientist in the Child Health and Human Development Program at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI-MUHC). She received her MD and PhD degrees from McGill University followed by postdoctoral training in reproductive molecular biology at Tufts University in Boston. Her research is in the field of reproductive and developmental epigenomics, as it pertains to normal development of children and the prevention of birth defects. Her group is interested in understanding the molecular and developmental regulation of gene expression in the male and female germlines with implications for the health of the resulting offspring. Among her specific interests are DNA methylation and genomic imprinting and the molecular and cellular targets for environmental effects on germ cells, including spermatogonial stem cells. In clinical studies she is examining the potential of assisted reproductive technologies, infertility, drug treatment and folate deficiency and supplementation to alter the human epigenome.

A native of Ireland, Colum graduated from Trinity College Dublin in 1990 with a degree in Natural Sciences, specializing in Genetics. He carried out his doctoral work in Sweden at the Karolinska Institute and Uppsala University, studying genomic imprinting in humans and mice. Following graduation in 1995, he moved to Columbia University in New York to look at the role of DNA methylation in regulating imprinting and retroviral repression, where he worked with Tim Bestor and Ben Tycko, obtaining fellowships from the Swedish Cancer Fund and the Leukemia Foundation. He moved to Ulster University, Northern Ireland in the UK to start his own group, where he carried out further research on epigenetic regulation of gene transcription, including both mechanistic work and epidemiological studies on the role of methylation in gene regulation for a number of human conditions. During the pandemic he was seconded to the health service where he led teams helping with the up-scaling of viral testing and with contact tracing. He has since moved back to Sweden where he now holds a chair in Medical Genetics at Linköping University and continues his work looking at epigenetic changes in response to environmental changes and to disease. Colum also acts as Platform Scientific Director for SciLifeLab’s Clinical Genomics unit in Linköping and is Editor-in-chief for the Elsevier journal Genomics.