Jesus G. Berdeja received his undergraduate degree from Stanford University and medical degree from Harvard University. He completed his internship and residency in the Department of Internal Medicine at the University of California in San Francisco and fellowships in medical oncology and hematology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore. Prior to joining the staff at the Sarah Cannon Research Institute and Tennessee Oncology, Dr. Berdeja held appointments in the Stem Cell and Bone Marrow Transplant Program and the Division of Hematology and Oncology at Loma Linda University in Loma Linda, California. Dr. Berdeja has been certified a Diplomate in internal medicine, medical oncology, and hematology by the American Board of Internal Medicine. Additionally, he is an active member of several professional organizations, including the International Myeloma Society, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the American Society of Hematology, the International Myeloma Working Group, the Clinical Trials Myeloma Intergroup Committee, and the Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research Plasma Cell Working Group. An active researcher, Dr. Berdeja has been the principal investigator on a number of funded clinical trials in the field of multiple myeloma. He has published extensively in the peer-reviewed literature and is a frequent invited lecturer.

Ajai Chari, M.D. is the Director of the Multiple Myeloma Program and a Professor of Clinical Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Chari’s research interests include the development of novel chemotherapy regimens, including Phase 1 and 2 studies. He has served as the principal investigator (PI) of several investigator-initiated trials as well as the national and international PI of several industry-sponsored studies. With a long standing dedication to research, Dr Chari has been involved in each of the therapies approved in multiple myeloma over the last two decades. He has published numerous articles in the field and is a frequently invited speaker at national and international meetings. Dr. Chari received undergraduate degree from Stanford University and his medical degree from the David Geffen School of Medicine at University of California – Los Angeles. He completed his residency in internal medicine at Columbia University Medical Center and a fellowship in hematology and oncology at the University of California – San Francisco.

Amrita Y. Krishnan completed her medical degree at Albany Medical College in New York as part of a combined BS-MD six-year accelerated program, where she was selected for the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society. Her postdoctoral training comprised residency and internship in the Strong Memorial Hospital Department of Medicine at the University of Rochester, as well as fellowships at City of Hope Medical Center, Harvard Medical School Beth Israel Hospital, and the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. Dr. Krishnan is a Diplomate of the American Board of Hematology. She is also active in several professional societies. She is the former Chair of the American Society of Clinical Oncology plasma cell committee and former Co-Chair of the Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research Plasma Cell Committee, and former Chair of the Blood and Marrow Transplant Clinical Trials Network myeloma committee and is a subcommittee member of the American Society of Hematology, American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation, a steering committee member for the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation and the North American representative for the International Myeloma Foundation and is a member of the state of the science committee for ASTCT focused on defining the next generation of therapies in myeloma. Dr. Krishnan has authored almost 200 articles, abstracts, and book chapters, and she is a reviewer for several journals, including American Journal of Hematology, Bone Marrow Transplantation, Haematologica, Blood, and Biology of Blood and Marrow Transplantation. An active researcher, Dr. Krishnan was instrumental in bringing successful transplant therapy to HIV patients with lymphoma when many believed such patients were too weak to tolerate the procedure. She is currently the principal investigator of an innovative trial utilizing zinc finger nuclease–based stem cell therapy for HIV treatment. She is also the co-chair of one of the largest myeloma transplant trials in the United States evaluating the role of minimal residual disease to guide maintenance.

Krina Patel, MD, MSc, is Associate Professor and Center Medical Director in the Department of Lymphoma/Myeloma of the Division of Cancer Medicine at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC) in Houston, TX. She treats only patients with plasma cell dyscrasias and is Principal Investigator for multiple ongoing phase I/II and III immune-oncology and maintenance clinical trials for myeloma patients. Her research interests include myeloma, developing cellular therapies like CAR T, and combining immunotherapy and chemotherapy in the induction, transplant, maintenance and salvage settings and she has completed significant clinical research in hematopoeitic stem cell transplantation. Dr. Patel completed her Hematology Oncology fellowship at MDACC and served as Chief Fellow. She received her MSc for a translational project she completed in the laboratory of Dr. Laurence Cooper, evaluating the combination of CAR T cells and TCR engineered cells with vaccine in in vitro and in vivo myeloma models. She served her clinical residency in internal medicine at the University of Texas UT Health in Houston, TX and earned her medical degree at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, TX.

University of Texas M D Anderson Cancer Center Fellowship, Cancer Rehabilitation, 2021 - 2022 Loma Linda University Health Education Consortium Residency, Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, 2018 - 2021 Loma Linda University Health Education Consortium Internship, Internal Medicine, 2017 - 2018