Keynote Address: "Emerging Infections of Critical Military Importance"

Robert A. Bonomo, MD, is Chief of the Medical Service and Director of the VISN 10 GRECC at the Cleveland VA Medical Center, and is Professor of Medicine, Pharmacology, Molecular Biology and Microbiology, Biochemistry, Proteomics, and Bioinformatics at Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) School of Medicine. Bonomo’s major interests are antibiotic resistance, infections in the elderly, and the application of molecular diagnostics to infectious diseases. His research interests include the mechanistic basis of resistance to beta-lactam antibiotics and beta-lactamase inhibitors, the molecular epidemiology of multidrug resistant gram-negative bacteria, and the implementation of molecular diagnostics in clinical care of patients with infectious disease. Dr. Bonomo is an elected member of the American Academy of Microbiology and the Association of American Physicians and Co-Director of the Laboratory Center of the Antibacterial Resistance Leadership Group (ARLG). Bonomo served as a member of the Advisory Panel on Assessment of Prevention, Diagnosis, and Treatment Options from Spring 2015 to Fall 2017, when it was integrated into the Clinical Effectiveness Decision and Science (CEDS) Advisory Panel. Bonomo served on the CEDS Advisory Panel from Fall 2017 to Spring 2018.

Keynote address: "Biosynthetic Blood Surrogates for Management of Trauma-induced Coagulopathy (TIC)"

Dr. Sen Gupta is the Director and Principal Investigator of the Bioinspired Engineering for Advanced Therapies (BEAT) laboratory. Dr. Sen Gupta received his MS (in 2001) and PhD (in 2003) from The University of Akron, Ohio, with focus on polymeric biomaterials engineering. Currently he is a Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Case Western Reserve University. Dr. Sen Gupta is currently the chair of the Biomaterials Engineering Track in the BME department at CWRU and he also serves as the Program Chair for the Biomaterials Education SIG in the Society for Biomaterials. He teaches several courses involving biomaterials, drug delivery, nanomedicine and quantitative biomolecular engineering. The research emphasis in his laboratory are in the areas of blood compatibility and blood-materials interactions, engineering of synthetic blood cells, targeted drug delivery in cardiovascular and cancer pathologies, and interfacial engineering for enhanced biocompatibility.

Keynote address: ''Oxygen: why is it needed during high performance aviation, and whether 'more is better' "

Dr. Michael Decker is a Professor of Nursing, Physiology, and Biophysics at Case Western Reserve University. He is a basic- and clinical scientist with formal doctoral training in systems neuroscience, having received a PhD from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. He is also a Diplomat of the American Board of Sleep Medicine and maintains licensure as a Registered Nurse and Respiratory Therapist. He is former faculty member of Emory School of Medicine’s Department of Neurology and also a Scientist within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. His laboratory’s ongoing research interests and endeavors focus upon defining physiologic, biochemical and genetic perturbations that evoke disorders of minimal brain dysfunction manifest by disorders of unremitting fatigue, hypersomnolence, executive dysfunction, impaired decision making, and an inability to respond to stress.