Scientific and Clinical Advisory Board
Dr. Atif Zafar, Chair
Dr. Atif Zafar obtained his Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) from Dow Medical College and completed his residency at the University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics. He also completed a Vascular Neurology Fellowship at the Cleveland Clinic. Upon completing his fellowship, Dr. Zafar became an Assistant Professor of Stroke and Vascular Neurology at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine, then moved to the position of Chief of the Stroke Program at University of New Mexico School of Medicine.
Presently, Dr. Zafar is an Assistant Professor of Medicine, Division of Neurology at the University of Toronto. Additionally, he is Co-Director of the Fellowship Program-Stroke at St. Michael’s Hospital and Medical Director of St. Michael’s Hospital Comprehensive Stroke Program.
Dr. Zafar is the Chair of the Scientific and Clinical Advisory Board at Cavernous
Malformation Canada. His clinical focus is on complex stroke cases and
cerebrovascular diseases. Dr. Zafar’s academic pursuits involve a personalized stroke algorithm, equitable care access and patient-centered care development.
Dr. W. Brent Derry, Vice Chair
Dr. Derry earned his B.Sc. (Honours) in Biochemistry at Carleton University in Ottawa, his M.Sc. in Biochemistry at McMaster University and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). He completed his postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Joel Rothman at UCSB, where he discovered and characterized the long sought after C. elegans p53 tumour suppressor gene cep-1. Dr. Derry joined the SickKids Research Institute in 2003 and uses C. elegans and human cells to model human diseases such as cerebral cavernous malformation (CCM). Dr. Derry holds a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Animal Models of Human Disease. He is a Senior Scientist in the Developmental and Stem Cell Biology Program at SickKids and a Full Professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto. His research is supported by funding from CIHR, NSERC, CFI and SickKids.
Dr. Derry previously served as the Vice-Chair of Fundamental Research in the Garron Family Cancer Centre and is currently the Research Integrity Advisor at SickKids. He is Vice Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board for Alliance to Cure Cavernous Malformation and will assume the position of chair in 2025. He is Vice Chair of the Scientific and Clinical Advisory Board for Cavernous Malformation Canada. Dr. Derry is also an editor with the FEBS Journal and an Affiliate for the pre-print server bioRxiv.
Outside of science, Dr. Derry enjoys walking his dog, playing hockey as well as writing and performing original music.
Dr. Peter Dirks, Director
Peter Dirks is a Professor of Surgery and Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto, he holds a Harold Hoffman/Shopper Drug Mart Chair in Pediatric Neurosurgery at Sick Kids where he is a Chief of Neurosurgery and senior scientist in the Developmental and Stem Cell Biology Program.
Dr. Peter Dirks graduated from Queen's University Medical School in Kingston, Ontario in 1989. Then, he completed his PhD in Molecular and Cellular Pathology in 1997 at the University of Toronto, his neurosurgery training at the University of Toronto in 1998 (Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, Canada, 1998) and his Paediatric Neurosurgery Fellowship training at L'hôpital Necker Enfants Malades (Paris) in 1998. Peter joined the neurosurgery staff at SickKids in 1998 where his interests lie with the entire spectrum of paediatric neurosurgical practice, with emphasis on the surgical treatment of childhood brain tumours and brain vascular malformations.
He established his research laboratory in the Arthur and Sonia Labatt Brain Tumour Research Centre at SickKids in 1999 where in 2004 he was the first to prospectively identify cancer stem cells (CSC’s) in human brain tumours, contributing to a paradigm shift in understanding solid cancer growth, and putting emphasis on consideration of stemness properties both experimentally and conceptually in the study of brain tumours which has had international impact. By continuing to push the boundaries of brain cancer research and by fostering a collaborative environment he has led several pivotal international team grants/collaborations on top of being continuously well funded through various research grants, infrastructure grants and philanthropic funding.
Over his career he has directly mentored over 23 graduate students and 14 postdoctoral fellows, many of which have gone on to academic positions with successful lab’s themselves, or to medical school and have gone on to be successful clinicians, or to industry or not-for-profit granting agencies.