Cesar A. Arias, MD. MSc, PhD serves as the Chief, Division of Infectious Diseases at Houston Methodist Hospital and Co-Director of the Center for Infectious Diseases at Houston Methodist Research Institute. Dr Arias is the current holder of the John F. III and Ann H. Bookout Distinguished Chair for Research Excellence at Houston Methodist and holds appointments as Professor of Medicine, Pathology and Genomic Medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College and Houston Methodist Academic Institute. He is also adjunct Professor at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX.

Dr. Arias earned his MD from Universidad El Bosque, Bogota, Colombia, MSc in Clinical Microbiology at the University of London, UK (St. Bartholomew’s and The Royal London Hospital School of Medicine and Dentistry), London, UK and his PhD in Molecular Microbiology from the University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK. He trained in Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases at University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX. He is certified in both Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases by the American Board of Internal Medicine.

Dr. Arias is a nationally and internationally recognized physician-scientist with > 25 years of experience in conducting NIH-funded basic, translational and clinical research on mechanisms of antibiotic resistance and the molecular epidemiology and clinical impact antibiotic resistant organisms, in particular with the use of state-of-the-art genomic analyses (>300 publications). Dr. Arias was one of the first recipients of the NIH K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award and his innovative work has been recognized by the American Society of Microbiology (Young Investigator Award), the Infectious Diseases Society of America (Oswald Avery Award for Early Achievement), Pan-American Society for Infectious Diseases (Isidro Zavala Medal for Early Career Outstanding Research in Infectious Diseases) and British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy (Young Investigator Award), among others.

Funded by the Wellcome Trust, Dr Arias also founded the Molecular Genetics and Antimicrobial Resistance Unit and International Center for Microbial Genomics at Universidad El Bosque, Bogota, Colombia, developing a major program on antibiotic resistance research in Latin America for the last 20 years. Dr Arias was inducted to the American Society for Clinical Investigation in 2015, elected Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology in 2019 and also Fellow of the Infectious Diseases Society of America.

Wendy Armstrong received her MD from Harvard Medical School and completed her Internal Medicine residency and Infectious Diseases (ID) fellowship at the University of Michigan. She joined the Emory University Division of Infectious Disease in 2007 and is now Professor of Medicine, Interim Division Director for ID and the Executive Medical Director of the Ponce de Leon Center at Grady Health System. The Ponce Center is a Ryan White funded program that provides comprehensive care to more than 6000 persons living with HIV in the Atlanta metro area.

Dr. Armstrong is a past chair of the HIV Medicine Association (HIVMA), is the Vice Chair of the Infectious Disease Society of America (IDSA) Board of Directors, co- Chair of the CDC/HRSA Advisory Committee on HIV, Viral Hepatitis and STD Prevention and Treatment (CHAC) and is the CHAC representative to the President’s Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS. Dr. Armstrong’s research interests in HIV include developing innovative approaches to improving the HIV continuum of care, including strategies for addressing linkage and retention in care and disparities in access to care. She also has a strong interest in and commitment to medical education and workforce development in ID and HIV.

Paul G Auwaerter is the Sherrilyn and Ken Fisher Professor of Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, serving as the Clinical Director for the Division of Infectious Diseases and Director of the Sherrilyn and Ken Fisher Center for Environmental Infectious Diseases.

He serves as the Executive Director of the Johns Hopkins Point of Care-Information Technology (POC-IT) Center producing the Johns Hopkins ABX (Antibiotic), JH HIV, JH Osler, JH Psychiatry and JH Diabetes Guides. Dr. Auwaerter serves as Editor-in-Chief of the ABX Guide. Over the last 20 years, it has become a standard reference for ID-related clinical decision support and rational antimicrobial management. Dr. Auwaerter’s research and clinical interests include improving the diagnosis and care for patients with Lyme disease and other tick-borne infections, surgical infections, Epstein-Barr virus, respiratory diseases, and antibiotic resistance. Dr. Auwaerter has developed therapeutic guidance for COVID-19 in the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions and facilitated monkeypox care and treatment. He is a Past President of the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA), the largest professional society worldwide related to infectious diseases.

John W. Baddley, MD, MSPH, is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He serves as Director of Transplant and Oncology Infectious Diseases and as Associate Director of the Clinical Trials Core in the Transplant Research Center. Dr. Baddley serves as President of the Transplantation Society’s Transplant Infectious Diseases Section and as Chairman of the ID Professional Community of the International Society for Heart and Lung transplantation. Dr. Baddley’s clinical work focuses on management of infections in the immunocompromised host. In addition to his clinical and teaching work, Dr. Baddley’s ongoing areas of research include clinical trials of antifungal therapies and the epidemiology of fungal infections. Dr. Baddley currently serves on the editorial boards of Transplant Infectious Diseases and Open Forum Infectious Diseases and is on the American Board of Internal Medicine’s Infectious Disease Exam Committee.

Dr. Daniel Diekema is Vice Chair for Research and Director of the Division of Infectious Diseases in the Department of Medicine at Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine. He is also a Professor Emeritus of Internal Medicine at the University of Iowa, where he served as a director for the Division of Infectious Diseases from 2010-2021. Dr. Diekema received his MD at Vanderbilt University in 1989. He did his residency in internal medicine at the University of Virginia (1989-1992). He did his fellowships in infectious diseases (1992-1995) and medical microbiology (1998-2000) at the University of Iowa. Also while at the University of Iowa, he received his master of science in preventive medicine. As a hospital epidemiologist, infectious diseases clinician and a clinical microbiologist, Dr. Diekema has studied and published extensively on the epidemiology of antimicrobial resistance and health care-associated infections. Dr. Diekema is a past president of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America, and was also a member and co-chair of the CDC Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee.

Helen Boucher, MD, is the Dean and Professor of Medicine at Tufts University School of Medicine and Chief Academic Officer of the Tufts Medicine Health System. An active Infectious Diseases physician, she was previously Chief of the Division of Geographic Medicine and Infectious Diseases at Tufts Medical Center, and Director of the Stuart B. Levy Center for Integrated Management of Antimicrobial Resistance (Levy CIMAR).

Dr. Boucher’s clinical interests include infections in immunocompromised patients and S. aureus infections. Her research interests focus on S. aureus and the development of new anti-infective agents. She is the Chair of the National Institutes of Health Antibacterial Resistance Leadership Group Innovations Working Group and serves on the Executive and Steering Committees. Dr. Boucher is the published in such journals as The New England Journal of Medicine, Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, Clinical Infectious Diseases, and The Annals of Internal Medicine. She is Associate Editor of Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, and Editor of the Sanford Guide to Antimicrobial Therapy, and Infectious Diseases Clinics of North America.

In 2015, Dr. Boucher was appointed a voting member of the Presidential Advisory Council on Combating Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria (PACCARB), and elected Treasurer of the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA). She was awarded the IDSA Society Citation Award in October 2015 and the Maxwell Finland Award in 2022. In 2023, she became an Honorary Fellow, Royal College of Physicians of Ireland the highest award the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland can confer. Dr. Boucher serves as Chair of the Board of Trustees of The College of the Holy Cross and as Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Physicians of Tufts Medical Center.

Charles L. Daley, M.D., is Chief of the Division of Mycobacterial and Respiratory Infections at National Jewish Health (NJH) and Professor of Medicine at NJH, the University of Colorado School of Medicine, and Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Dr. Daley has served on and chaired expert panels for the World Health Organization (WHO), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Infectious Diseases Society of America and American Thoracic Society. He chaired the multi-society sponsored revision of the guidelines for the treatment of pulmonary nontuberculous mycobacterial infections. For his work with global MDR-TB control he was awarded the World Lung Health Award by the American Thoracic Society. He was previously Associate Editor of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine and The European Respiratory Journal and is now Associate Editor for Frontiers in Tuberculosis. His academic interests include clinical and translational research related to TB, NTM and bronchiectasis.

Carlos del Rio, MD is the H. Cliff Sauls, MD Distinguished Professor of Medicine and Chair of the Department of Medicine at Emory University School of Medicine. He is also Professor of Global Health and Epidemiology at the Rollins School of Public Health. Dr. del Rio is co-Director of the Emory Center for AIDS Research and co-PI of the Emory Vaccine and Treatment Evaluation Unit. A native of Mexico where he attended medical school graduating with honors in 1983. He did his Medicine and Infectious Diseases training at Emory. In 1989 he returned to Mexico where he was Executive Director of the National AIDS Council. In 1996 Dr. del Rio returned to Emory where he is involved in patient care, teaching and research. Dr. del Rio has had multiple leadership positions at Emory including Chief of the Emory Medical Service at Grady Memorial Hospital (2001 – 2009), chair of the Hubert Department of Global Health (2009 – 2019), Executive Associate Dean for Emory at Grady (2019 – 2023) and interim Dean of Emory University School of Medicine (2023 – 2024). Dr. del Rio’s research focuses on the early diagnosis, access to care, engagement in care, compliance with antiretrovirals and the prevention of HIV infection. He has worked for over a decade with hard-to-reach populations including with persons who use substances to improve outcomes of those infected with HIV and to prevent infection with those at risk. He is also interested in the translation of research findings into practice and policy. His international work includes collaborations in the country of Georgia, Ethiopia, Vietnam, Mexico, Kenya and Thailand. He has also worked on emerging infections such as pandemic influenza and was a member of the WHO Influenza A(H1N1) Clinical Advisory Group and of the CDC Influenza A(H1N1) Task Force during the 2009 pandemic. He is the Immediate Past President of the Infectious Diseases Society of America and the past chair of the PEPFAR Scientific Advisory Committee. del Rio was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2013 and elected as the Academy’s International Secretary in 2020 and reelected in 2024. He was also elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2022. During the COVID-19 pandemic Dr. del Rio was a leader locally and nationally, doing research, developing policies, writing scientific publications, and making countess media appearances. Dr. del Rio advised municipal, state, and national leaders and also served on the national advisory committee of the COVID Collaborative, which focuses on developing consensus recommendations and engaging with U.S. leaders on effective policy and coronavirus response.Dr. del Rio was named as one of the “50 most trusted experts” and recognized by the HHS Secretary as a “Trusted Messenger”.

Dr. Daniel Diekema is Vice Chair for Research and Director of the Division of Infectious Diseases in the Department of Medicine at Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine. He is also a Professor Emeritus of Internal Medicine at the University of Iowa, where he served as a director for the Division of Infectious Diseases from 2010-2021. Dr. Diekema received his MD at Vanderbilt University in 1989. He did his residency in internal medicine at the University of Virginia (1989-1992). He did his fellowships in infectious diseases (1992-1995) and medical microbiology (1998-2000) at the University of Iowa. Also while at the University of Iowa, he received his master of science in preventive medicine. As a hospital epidemiologist, infectious diseases clinician and a clinical microbiologist, Dr. Diekema has studied and published extensively on the epidemiology of antimicrobial resistance and health care-associated infections. Dr. Diekema is a past president of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America, and was also a member and co-chair of the CDC Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee.

Monica Gandhi MD, MPH is a Professor of Medicine and Associate Chief in the Division of HIV, Infectious Diseases, and Global Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). She is also the Director of the UCSF Center for AIDS Research (CFAR) and the Medical Director of the HIV Clinic ("Ward 86") at San Francisco General Hospital. Her research focuses on HIV treatment and prevention, HIV and women, adherence measurement in HIV and TB, adherence interventions, and on optimizing the use of long-acting antiretroviral therapy (ART)

Dr. Goff is an Infectious Diseases Clinical Pharmacist, Professor of Pharmacy Practice and Antibiotic Stewardship Ambassador for The Ohio State University (OSU) Global One Health Institute in Columbus Ohio, USA. She is an awarding winning global “change maker” in infectious diseases. Dr. Goff is one of twenty-five global health experts selected by the World Health Organization (WHO) to implement antibiotic stewardship programs in low middle-income countries. Dr. Goff is the Program Director for the the Trainer Antibiotic Stewardship Mentoring Program founded in 2012 with South African pharmacists. Her program continues to expand to include neonatal ASP and other countries including Lebanon and six Latin American countries in collaboration with country experts and neonatal experts at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus OH. She received the OSU 2019 Distinguished International Outreach and Engagement Award for her global work and the 2017 American College of Clinical Pharmacy Global Health Award. Dr. Goff is the Principal Investigator on the first US study with private practice dentists to assess their antibiotic use and provide guidance on the use of antibiotics in dentistry. Dr. Goff speaks to dental study clubs, dental schools, the FDI World Dental Federation and US Dental CE Academy providing antibiotic stewardship education to over 3,800 dental providers in over 80 countries. Her TEDx talk titled antibiotics “just in case” there’s infection has over 28,500 views on YouTube. She uses X (Twitter) (@idpharmd) to connect with her 10,000 followers. She has 150 publications and 50 grants.

Dr. Andy Hale received his undergraduate education at Middlebury College, then went to medical school at Tufts University School of Medicine. He completed internal medicine residency, chief residency, and infectious diseases fellowship at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical. He is now an associate professor and ID physician at the University of Vermont Medical Center. He is the course director of cardiac, respiratory, and renal pathophysiology at UVM College of Medicine, Infectious Diseases: past, present, and future at Middlebury College, and Comparative Physiology at Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory. He is an associate program director for the internal medicine residency at UVM. His main research interests are pragmatic studies to answer common clinical dilemmas in ID.  

Dr. Kimberly Hanson is a Professor of Medicine and Pathology at the University of Utah (U of U). Administratively, she serves as the Director of the Immunocompromised Host Infectious Diseases Service for U of U Health and is Director of the Mycology Section within ARUP Laboratories. Her clinical and research interests involve the development and validation of novel diagnostic tests with a focus on opportunistic infections.

Dr. Thomas L. Holland, MD, MSc-GH, is a Professor of Infectious Diseases at Duke University and a faculty member of the Duke Clinical Research Institute. His research interests include antibacterial trials, particularly for S. aureusbacteremia and antibiotic-resistant pathogens, as well as the design and implementation of novel clinical trial endpoints including ordinal outcomes and quality of life measures. He is active in COVID clinical care and research as well as research in novel diagnostics.

Raphael J. Landovitz, MD, MSc, is Professor of Medicine and interim Chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the David Geffen School of Medicine; He also serves as Director of the UCLA Center for Clinical AIDS Research & Education. He serves as MPI of the NIAID-funded HIV Prevention Trials Network, and also as MPI of the UCLA AIDS Prevention and Treatment Clinical Trials Unit. He is also the Director of the UCLA Center for Clinical AIDS Research & Education, and Co-Director of the National Institute of Mental Health-funded Center for HIV Identification Prevention and Treatment Services (CHIPTS). His research is focused on the optimization of the use of antiretroviral medication for both HIV treatment and HIV prevention.

Dr. Landovitz has longstandingly been part of the leadership of the NIAID-funded AIDS Clinical Trial Group (ACTG), HIV Prevention Trial Network (HPTN), and the Adolescent Trial Network (ATN). He serves on the Executive Committee, is Chair of the Manuscript Review Committee, and serves on the Biomedical Sciences Scientific Committee of the HPTN, served as Chair of the ACTG Antiretroviral Strategies Transformative Science Group, and is Chair of the Biomedical Therapeutics, Complications and Comorbidities Scientific Leadership Group for the ATN. He was awarded the John Carey Young Investigator Award from the ACTG in 2010, the HIVMA HIV Research Award in 2017, the Ward Cates Award and the Donna Davis award from the HPTN and ACTG respectively in 2023. He leads several biomedical and behavioral prevention intervention studies and projects using Post-Exposure Prophylaxis (PEP) and Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) strategies for men who have sex with men and cis- and transgender women, including the NIH/DAIDS-funded Phase 2 and Phase 3 registrational clinical trials evaluating long-acting injectable cabotegravir for PrEP, which contributed to recent US FDA and multiple other regulatory approvals. He currently is evaluating implementation of long-acting injectable PrEP, as well as continuing to study other investigational long-acting/extended release products and delivery systems for HIV and STI prevention.  

Dr. Carl LeBuhn completed medical school, internal medicine residency, chief residency, and infectious diseases fellowship at the University of Iowa. He spent three years on the teaching faculty at the University of Iowa before entering private practice in Paducah, Kentucky in June of 2000. For the past 21 years he has has provided inpatient and outpatient general infectious diseases consultations for western Kentucky and southern Illinois. He has clinical privileges at Baptist Health Paducah, ContinueCare Hospital at Baptist Health Paducah, and Mercy Health Paducah. He and his partner provide HIV/AIDS care to approximately 400 patients through LivWell a federally funded HIV/AIDS organization. He is currently the chair of the Paducah Independent Schools Board of Education and has served on the Board since 2005.

Robin Patel is the Elizabeth P. and Robert E. Allen Professor of Individualized Medicine and the Director of the Infectious Diseases Research Laboratory, Co-Director of the Clinical Bacteriology Laboratory, Vice Chair of Education in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, and former Chair of the Division of Clinical Microbiology, at the Mayo Clinic.

Since the beginning of her tenure at the Mayo Clinic, Dr. Patel has focused her research on bacterial infections. Her work focuses on three major areas: (1) improvement of next-generation diagnostic techniques for infectious diseases, (2) understanding the inherent biology of periprosthetic infection, and (3) understanding antibiotic resistance through a clinical lens. She has published over 625 peer-reviewed publications and is supported by the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She is the Director of the Laboratory Center of the Antibacterial Resistance Leadership Group of the National Institutes of Health.

Dr. Patel received an undergraduate degree in Chemistry from Princeton University, where she graduated magna cum laude. From there, she obtained a medical degree from McGill University. Afterwards, Dr. Patel completed Internal Medicine Residency and Fellowships in Medical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases at the Mayo Clinic. Since then, she has been involved in setting standards for diagnostic and clinical care of bacterial infections, as evidenced by the (select) positions she has held or holds within the American Society for Microbiology (President, Secretary), American Board of Pathology (Microbiology Test Writing Committee Member), Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (Subcommittee on Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing Voting Member), National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (Council Member), National Board of Medical Examiners (Microbiology/Immunology Test Material Development Committee Chair), Journal of Clinical Microbiology (Associate Editor), Clinical Infectious Diseases (Associate Editor) and the Presidential Advisory Council on Combating Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria (Voting Member).

In addition, Dr. Patel’s continued commitment to mentorship can be translated into a long list of trainees from around the world; she had dedicated hours of teaching to train the next generation of clinical and research laboratory scientists.

More information can be found at: https://journals.asm.org/doi/full/10.1128/JCM.01259-20.

Anton Peleg is a Professor of Infectious Diseases and Microbiology, Director of the Department of Infectious Diseases at The Alfred Hospital and Monash University, Director of the Centre to Impact Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR), Monash University, and Theme Leader for Infection and Immunity at the Monash Academic Health Research and Translational Centre. He has also recently been elected as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences.

He completed his infectious diseases clinical training in Australia in 2005 and then went to the USA for four years and trained at the Harvard-affiliated hospitals; Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Massachusetts General Hospital. He completed a Masters of Public Health at Harvard School of Public Health, and also completed a PhD in Infectious Diseases and Microbiology with a focus on AMR and microbial genomics. He returned to Australia in 2010 as a clinician-scientist and built a large research program that spans fundamental, translational and clinical research.