Dr Ajay Aggarwal is a Consultant Clinical Oncologist at Guy’s & St Thomas’ NHS Trust, London. He has Honorary appointments at King’s College London, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and The MRC Clinical Trials Unit, London. His main research areas are health services research, clinical epidemiology and global health. Since 2013, he has been the Oncology Coordinator for the National Prostate Cancer Audit, based at the Royal College of Surgeons of England.

As part of this work, he developed the first-ever national radiotherapy outcomes public reporting program. In 2017, he completed a NIHR PhD Fellowship at The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine exploring patient choice and the role of NHS hospital competition in the adoption of high cost medical devices for cancer treatment using quantiative and qualitative research methods. He has worked at the World Health Organisation in Geneva and has ongoing projects in Ghana, Botswana, and Tanzania aimed at building radiotherapy capacity and research capabilty. He was recently awarded in collaboration with the MD Anderson Cancer Centre, USA, a Wellcome Trust Digital Innovator Award, to use Artificial Intelligence to automate radiotherapy treatment planning for the treatment of urgent and emergency presentations of advanced cancers. He has previously gained a BSc in Management at Imperial College London, a MSc in the Science of Cancer from The Institute of Cancer Research and a MSc in Health, Population and Society from The London School of Economics where he undertook research into complex health systems and behavioural public policies.

Christopher Booth MD FRCPC is a Medical Oncologist and Health Services Researcher at Queen’s University in Kingston, Canada. He is a Professor of Oncology and holds the Canada Research Chair in Population Cancer Care. Dr. Booth studied medicine at Queen’s University and did postgraduate training in Internal Medicine and Medical Oncology at the University of Toronto. Upon completing his clinical training he spent two years as a research fellow with the NCIC Clinical Trials Group. In his clinical practice he provides care to patients with gastrointestinal and urologic cancers.

Dr. Booth has an active program in population-based cancer research. The focus of his research program is to evaluate the quality of care delivered to patients in routine clinical practice and the effectiveness of new therapies in the general population. In 2016 Dr. Booth spent a sabbatical as a visiting scientist at the Regional Cancer Centre in Trivandrum, India. He continues to work closely with colleagues in India on various projects to improve accessibility and quality of cancer care. Dr. Booth serves as an Advisor (Implementation Research) to the National Cancer Grid of India. As a junior investigator he was awarded an inaugural Cancer Care Ontario Chair in Health Services Research. Dr. Booth has published over 200 peer-reviewed manuscripts with first or senior author papers in Nature, JAMA, BMJ, Lancet Oncology, and Journal of Clinical Oncology. He has served as research supervisor for more than 25 trainees.

Marc Buyse holds a ScD in biostatistics from the Harvard School of Public Health (Boston, MA). He worked at the EORTC in Brussels and at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.

He is the founder of the International Drug Development Institute (IDDI) and of CluePoints, two biostatistical service organizations based in the US and Europe. His interests include clinical trial design, meta-analysis, validation of biomarkers and surrogate endpoints, statistical methods in oncology, statistical detection of errors and fraud, statistical monitoring of clinical trials, and medical data sharing (http://publicationslist.org/marc.buyse ).

Girish Chinnaswamy completed his medical school and post graduate training in paediatrics at Jawaharlal Institute of Postgraduate Medical Education and Research (JIPMER) Pondicherry. He further underwent subspeciality training in paediatric and adolescent oncology at the Royal London and Newcastle Upon Tyne Hospitals in the United Kingdom.

He subsequently pursued research in paediatric cancer pharmacology at the Northern Institute of Cancer Research, Newcastle University studying the pharmacokinetics and pharmacogenomics of anticancer drugs in Children. He has previously worked as a faculty in paediatric oncology at Christian Medical college hospital Vellore and is presently working as a consultant at Tata Memorial Hospital. His special interests are paediatric neuro-oncology and bone tumors in children.

Dr David Collingridge has been Editor-in-Chief of The Lancet Oncology since March 2002 and is also the Publishing Director for The Lancet’s specialty journals. Prior to his appointments at The Lancet, he gained a PhD in Tumour Biology from the Gray Cancer Institute/University College London, UK, and held research posts in the Department of Therapeutic Radiology, Yale University, CT, USA, and in the PET Oncology Group, Imperial College School of Medicine, Hammersmith Hospital, London, UK. Dr Collingridge has won several awards for projects focused on cancer control in low-to-middle income countries; has published numerous peer-review articles, editorials, opinion pieces, and news reports; and has co-authored a text book on radiobiology. He currently also holds the position of Clinical Associate Professor of Radiation Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell Health, Lake Success, NY, USA.

Chris Frampton is Professor, Biostatistics, Department of Medicine/Psychological Medicine, University of Otago, and Director of a statistical consultancy company based in Christchurch, New Zealand.

In addition, he is the statistical representative on New Zealand’s regulatory committees - the Standing Committee on Therapeutic Trials, Medicines Adverse Reactions Committee, and Medicines Assessment Advisory Committee - and on a number of national and international data safety monitoring committees for ongoing randomised controlled trials. Professor Frampton has a specific interest in the design, conduct and analysis of phase I, II and III randomised controlled trials. With over 30 years of experience in biostatistics consultancy as applied to a wide range of clinical disciplines, he has co-authored over 700 peer reviewed publications.

Durga Gadgil is currently a consultant with the Tata Memorial Administrative and Research Council (TRAC). She is the chief coordinator for the two-year MSc in Clinical Research course conducted by the Tata Memorial Centre under the Homi Bhabha National Institute. She is also a GCP Trainer and conducts workshops and seminars for the same. Besides, she is instrumental in setting up the National Cancer Grid Contract Research Organization (NCG CRO) at TMH, which monitors NCG funded, multicentric studies carried out in India.

She has 31 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry and retired in November 2015 as Area Head, Asia Pacific, Regional Medical Monitoring Organization, Pfizer. In this role, she was the line manager for medical monitors based in Australia, India, Singapore, Hong Kong, China, Korea, Taiwan and Philippines. The team was responsible for monitoring all global studies from Phase 2 to 4 for medical aspects, ensuring patient eligibility, protocol adherence, data integrity and quality, in compliance with local and global ethical principles.

Durga is a certified NABH assessor for NABH Accreditation Standards for Clinical Trials (Ethics Committee, Investigator, Clinical Trial Site)

During her career span of 30+ years, she has worked in many pharmaceutical companies, all MNCs and one India company. She has experience in all fields related to a medical doctor’s role in the industry, like medico-marketing support, regulatory activities, pharmacovigilance and safety reporting, clinical operations, medical monitoring, auditing and training.

Allan Hackshaw is Professor of Epidemiology & Medical Statistics at University College London, and Deputy Director of the Cancer Research UK & UCL Cancer Trials Centre, one of the largest cancer trials units in the UK. He has over 26 years’ experience in the design, conduct and interpretation of clinical trials (phase I-III), observational studies (cohort and case-control) and systematic reviews/meta-analyses: for prevention, screening or treatment. The main areas of research have been cancer; antenatal & cancer screening; and tobacco and health..

He has been a key co-investigator on successful grant funding applications (>£80 million in total), and published more than 150 articles in journals and book chapters, plus sole or first author of four textbooks. He leads courses or modules on postgraduate courses (evidence-based medicine/clinical trials) at UCL and London School of Economics. He has been a member of national and international scientific grant funding and data monitoring committees. In 2013 he was named as one of the top 40 academic role models in biomedicine at UCL.

Ruth Langley is a medical oncologist with a particular interest in the design and management of clinical trials. Her training included time at the Joint Centre for Radiation Therapy, Boston USA studying for her PhD in radiation-induced apoptosis. She is based at the UK Medical Research Council Clinical Trials Unit in London where she leads the Cancer Group.

She has a particular interest in gastro-oesophageal malignancy and has co-ordinated a series of trials and associated translational studies, and has led the investigation of the use of transdermal oestrogen in the treatment of prostate cancer. A major focus of her recent work has been the development of an international trial to assess the effect of aspirin as an adjuvant agent in several common solid tumours.

She has an honorary clinical consultant post at the Brighton and Sussex University Hospital.

Dr Indranil Mallick completed his degree in radiation oncology at the Post-Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India and subsequently trained at the Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai, India and the Princess Margaret Hospital (University of Toronto), Toronto, Canada..

His key research interests include technical aspects of radiotherapy (image guidance, planning techniques, PET- CT guidance), hypofractionated radiotherapy in prostate and head and neck cancers and education research – developing and testing online educational courses.

Dr Sreekumaran Nair has thirty three years of experience in biostatistics with extensive experience in post PhD teaching, research and mentoring in the medical college/health science/public health/medical university setting. He presently leads the Biostatistics Masters, Doctoral and Research Leadership mentoring programme at JIPMER, Puducherry.

Xavier Paoletti is a professor of biostatistics at the University of Versailles St Quentin and at the Institut Curie, a cancer center, in Paris, France; he is a member of the INSERM U900 research unit dedicated to the development of statistical methods for clinical trials integrating biomarkers.

After a phd on early phase clinical trials, Xavier had several positions at the EORTC, at Bichat university hospital then at the French NCI and finally in two leading cancer centers, Institut Curie and Gustave Roussy.

His main interests are in the methods for dose finding trials, the designs of trials evaluating personalized medicine and the validation of surrogate endpoints. He is involved with Koji Oba in the secretariat of the GASTRIC collaboration for performing meta-analyses in gastric cancers and he coordinate the gynecology cancer inter group (GCIG) meta-analysis with Dr Ros Glasspool for performing meta-analyses in ovarian cancer.

Mahesh (Max) Parmar is a Professor of Medical Statistics and Epidemiology and Director of the MRC Clinical Trials Unit at UCL and the Institute of Clinical Trials and Methodology at University College London.

Until 2012 he was an Associate Director of the National Cancer Research Network since its inception in 2001, an organisation which more than tripled the number of patients going into cancer studies in England. Max joined the MRC in 1987.  He has more than 300 publications in peer reviewed journals, many of which have had direct impact on policy, clinical practice and improving outcomes for patients. The Unit he directs is at the forefront of resolving internationally important questions, particularly in infectious diseases and cancer, and also aims to deliver swifter and more effective translation of scientific research into patient benefits. It does this by carrying out challenging and innovative studies and by developing and implementing methodological advances in study design, conduct and analysis.

C S Pramesh is the Director of the Tata Memorial Hospital and a thoracic surgeon at the Tata Memorial Centre, the largest cancer centre in India. He is also a member of the Clinical Research Secretariat of the hospital and the convener for the National Cancer Grid, a large network of 177 cancer centres in India. In the latter role, he works extensively on eliminating disparities in cancer care by enabling uniform standards of cancer care, promoting equity in access to care, rational use of healthcare resources and promoting multicentric collaborative research.

His primary clinical areas of interest include minimal invasive surgery and innovative treatment options in the management of esophageal and lung cancer. He is the Principal Investigator in several investigator-initiated research studies including randomised trials on cancer screening, surgical techniques, and neoadjuvant and adjuvant treatment of thoracic cancers. Professor Pramesh has strong interests in clinical trial designs, surgical trials, biostatistics and promoting collaborative research.

He is passionate about promoting training of early career physicians and surgeons in clinical research methods and conducts several formal and informal courses on clinical research methodology, biostatistics and scientific writing.

Professor Arnie Purushotham has been a Consultant Academic Surgeon for 24 years having worked in Glasgow, Cambridge and London. He is Professor of Breast Cancer at King’s College London and Consultant Surgeon at Guy’s and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust in 2005. He is the Director of King’s Health Partners Comprehensive Cancer Centre, Medical Director Tata Trusts Cancer Care Program and Senior Clinical Advisor to Cancer Research UK.

As a scientific researcher for the last 27 years, Professor Purushotham’s goal has been to drive high quality clinical and translational research that directly impacts on cancer patients. Key areas of research are patterns of metastatic spread, pathophysiology of lymphoedema, sentinel lymph node biopsy, novel optical intra-operative imaging, window of opportunity trials and cancer outcomes. His specific areas of expertise include study design, ethics and regulatory permissions, research governance, user involvement, window of opportunity studies and randomized controlled trials

Dr Ramakrishnan is a surgical oncologist (gastrointestinal oncology) and is one of the founding members of the South Indian Oncology Group (SIOG), a multicenter collaborative group formed to promote cancer research in India. He has been awarded the Global Challenges Research Networking Fund Grant by the Academy of Medical Sciences, UK for the project titled ‘Large bowel microbiome disease network - Creation of a proof of principle exemplar in colorectal cancer across three continents’. He has several publications in national and international journals.

Priya Ranganathan works as Professor of Anesthesiology at the Tata Memorial Centre, which is a tertiary-level cancer centre in Mumbai, India. She deals mainly with anesthesia for thoracic surgical procedures especially esophageal and lung resections.

She has a keen interest in clinical research methods and biostatistics and has been faculty on several short courses on these topics. She coordinates a Masters degree in Clinical Research at the Tata Memorial Centre. She is a member of the Institutional Review Board at Tata Memorial Hospital and is editor of the biostatistics section for the journal ‘Perspectives in Clinical Research’.

Priya completed her medical training at the King Edward Memorial Hospital, Mumbai and a fellowship in Clinical Anesthesia at the Singapore General Hospital..

Prachi Patil is a Professor in the Department of Digestive Diseases and Clinical Nutrition at the Tata Memorial Centre, Mumbai, India. She completed her Gastroenterology training at the Tata Memorial Hospital. Her areas of interest are gastrointestinal cancers, therapeutic endoscopy and clinical nutrition. She is an ACORD alumnus (2010). She has been a member of the Institutional Review Board as well as the data and safety monitoring sub-committee at Tata Memorial Hospital. She has been a PI for several investigator-initiated as well as industry sponsored clinical trials.

Manju Sengar [MD (Medicine), DM (Medical Oncology)] is Professor, Adult hematolymphoid disease management group, Medical Oncology at the Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai. Dr Sengar completed her training in Medical Oncology from All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi.

She has done her post graduate diploma in clinical trials from London School of hygiene and tropical medicine (external programme). She is an ACORD alumnus. She is a recipient of American Society of Hematology visitor training program fellowship at Duke University, Durham. Her main areas of clinical research are non Hodgkin lymphomas in HIV/AIDS and adult acute lymphoblastic leukemia. She is the principal investigator for several investigator-initiated studies and has participated in industry sponsored multi-centre clinical trials.

Martin Stockler is Professor of Oncology and Clinical Epidemiology at the University of Sydney, a consultant medical oncologist at the Concord Repatriation General Hospital and Chris O’Brien Lifehouse RPA, and Oncology Co-Director at the NHMRC Clinical Trials Centre.

After internal medicine and medical oncology training in Sydney, Australia he spent 3 years in Toronto, Canada doing a clinical research fellowship at the Princess Margaret Hospital and a Masters in Clinical Epidemiology at the University of Toronto with Ian Tannock and Pamela Goodwin. His research focuses on using clinical trials to improve quality of life, survival, prognostication, and doctor-patient communication for those affected by cancer, particularly from genitourinary, thoracic, and gynaecologic primaries. His clinical focus is on genitourinary cancer. “The first protocol I wrote was for a randomised trial incorporating quality of life assessment in routine clinical practice, but this never went ahead. My first successful protocol was for a small (tiny), placebo-controlled, crossover trial of paracetamol (acetaminophen) for people with advanced cancer and troublesome pain despite a strong opioid regimen (J Clin Oncol 2004: 22; 3389).”

Dr. Tannock is Emeritus Professor of Medicine and Medical Biophysics at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre and University of Toronto. He obtained his PhD in London, England and his MD at University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA. His clinical research investigates methods related to cancer clinical trials, and he chaired trials for men with metastatic prostate cancer that led to licensing of previous (mitoxantrone) and current (docetaxel) standard chemotherapy. His laboratory research evaluated effects of the tumour microenvironment on outcome of cancer therapy.

Dr. Tannock is an editor of the Basic Science of Oncology textbook, soon to be in its 6 th edition, that is used by trainees in all branches of oncology. He was a member of the Board of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) from 2001-2004, and was chair of the scientific audit committee of the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) and a member of the EORTC Board from 2011-2017.  Dr Tannock was the first non-European to receive the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) award (2012) and he received the Allan Lichter visionary leader award from ASCO in 2019. Dr. Tannock received an honorary degree (DSc) from London University, UK in 2009, and was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 2013.

Shivakumar Thiagarajan graduated from KIMS, Bangalore. After which he did his post-graduation in Otolaryngology from the Indian AirForce Hospital, Bangalore.

He further underwent sub-speciality training in Head and Neck Surgical Oncology from Kidwai Memorial Institute of Oncology, Bangalore and Tata Memorial centre, Mumbai. He was actively involved in both clinical and translational research during his training. He has worked as a faculty in both Otolaryngology and Head and Neck surgical oncology, during which he has been part of various research projects. He is presently working as a faculty in the department of Head and Neck surgical oncology, Tata Memorial Centre, Mumbai, India. His primary clinical interest is in the management of oral, thyroid and skull base malignancies.