Audrey Calderwood, MD, MS is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center and the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice in Lebanon, NH. Quality in colonoscopy has been an overarching theme throughout her career. She validated, disseminated and educated providers on the Boston Bowel Preparation Scale during her NIH Career Development Award. She has received funding from the National Cancer Institute to optimize use of colonoscopy in older adults. At the national level, she has been highly involved in the American Society of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy where she served for six years on the Quality Assurance in Endoscopy Committee. She co-directed a national course on quality in the endoscopy unit and co-chaired the multi-society guidelines on safety in the endoscopy unit and infection control in endoscopy. She also serves on the American College of Gastroenterology’s Research Committee and Women’s Committee.

Barbara Demediuk, MD graduated with honors in 1984 from the University of Melbourne and trained in Gastroenterology at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School in Boston and Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research in Parkville.  She is in clinical practice as consultant gastroenterologist at St. Vincent’s Hospital Melbourne, Australia where she works in endoscopy, liver clinic and on ward service.  She also has a private practice based at St Vincent’s Private Hospital in general gastroenterology. 

Michael L. Kochman, MD, AGAF, FACP is the Wilmott Family Professor of Medicine and Professor of Medicine in Surgery in the Gastroenterology Division at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. He is the Vice-Chair of Medicine for Clinical Services. Dr. Kochman is a graduate of Northwestern University (1982) and the University of Illinois Medical School at Chicago (1986). He served his residency at the University of Illinois at Chicago and was chief resident at West Side VA from 1989-90. Subsequently, Dr. Kochman completed his fellowship in gastroenterology and hepatology at the University of Michigan Hospitals and Clinics, Ann Arbor in 1993. During that time, Dr. Kochman also underwent training in interventional endoscopy and had specialized training in endoscopic ultrasound at Indiana University, Bloomington. Subsequently, he was recruited to the University of Pennsylvania, where he rose through the ranks from Assistant Professor.  Within the GI division, he has served as fellowship chairman and runs the regular endoscopy and advanced endoscopy training programs. He has received a number of teaching awards including the Sid Cohen, MD, and Donald Martin, MD, awards for the education of fellows and residents. Dr. Kochman is the Chair of the AGA Center of Innovation and Technology and editor for Techniques in Gastrointestinal Endoscopy. He also serves as a reviewer for a number of journals and has published more than 225 articles and chapters and a number of videos. He has edited 19 published books: among them, the Clinicians Guide to Gastrointestinal Oncology (ed. Kochman), Advanced Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (eds. Ginsberg, Gostout, Kochman and Norton), and Endoscopic Oncology: Gastrointestinal Endoscopy and Cancer Management (eds. Faigel and Kochman). 

James Lewis, MD, MSCE is Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology and Senior Scholar in the Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Dr. Lewis has been actively involved in clinical research related to inflammatory bowel diseases, cancer prevention, medication safety, and optimizing medical therapies for more than 15 years. He has employed a various research methods to address these questions, ranging from mathematical modeling to placebo-controlled randomized trials. His work has been funded by the NIH, AHRQ, PCORI, and numerous foundations and corporate sponsors. Dr. Lewis previously served as the Chair of the National Scientific Advisory Committee for the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation of America (CCFA) and as associate editor for Gastroenterology and Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety. He is currently the lead scientist for the CCFA’s IBD Plexus. 

Maria Sippola-Thiele, PhD, MBA brings a wealth of expertise in business development and intellectual property management to Dark Canyon Laboratories.  Dr. Sippola-Thiele served as the Associate Director of the first Human Genome and Gene Therapy Center at the University of Michigan Medical Center, under the Direction of Francis Collins, as Associate Director of the University of Michigan Medical Center Technology and Corporate Research Office and as Assistant Dean for Business Development at the Duke University School of Medicine. Dr. Sippola-Thiele has served as a founder, CEO and other leadership positions in biotechnology and therapeutic development companies and currently serves as the Chief Business Officer at Chaperone Therapeutics, Inc. in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina.  Dr. Sippola-Thiele received her PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Turku, Finland, where she studied human connective tissue disorders, carried out Postdoctoral training in tumor virus biology at the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health and obtained her MBA at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business. Dr. Sippola-Thiele holds Adjunct Faculty appointments in both the Department of Medicine and Department of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology at the Duke University School of Medicine.