Keynote Speakers

Macfarlane Burnet Oration:
Each year at the ASID Annual Scientific Meeting, a world-renowned expert in infectious diseases is awarded the honour of presenting the Macfarlane Burnet Oration, named for the Nobel Prize winning Australian virologist Sir Frank Macfarlane Burnet, a pioneer in the fields of virology and immunology.

Professor Colleen Kraft
Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and the Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, Emory University

Dr Colleen Kraft, MD, MSc is a Professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and the Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases.  Dr Kraft is an inpatient infectious diseases clinician, and has served in a consultant role for the clinical microbiology section of Emory Medical laboratories since 2010, along with being program director of the medical microbiology fellowship.  Dr Kraft is the program director of the Georgia CTSA Clinical Research Centres, and the laboratory director of the clinical virology core in the Centre for AIDS Research.  She is a key opinion leader in faecal microbiota transplant use in C. difficile infection.  She was a part of the clinical team that cared for patients with Ebola virus disease at Emory in 2014, and served on Georgia's COVID-19 task force during the pandemic.  Dr Kraft recently transitioned from Associate Chief Medical Officer of Emory University Hospital to a research Informatician role in Emory Digital in order to return to her early career goal of leveraging information science in the clinical setting based on bacterial genome sequencing.   

Prof. Kraft's research interests are in next-generation sequencing, microbiome therapeutics and healthcare innovation factors. She is involved in multiple clinical trials and has published almost 200 peer-reviewed papers. She is the immediate Past President of the American Society for Microbiology, and is passionate about training the next global generation and believes that creativity and innovation in federal policy can bring about lasting positive change in science.  



Professor Atul Humar
Department of Medicine, University of Toronto

Atul Humar, MD, MSc, FRCPC is a Professor in the Department of Medicine, University of Toronto. Dr Humar received his medical degree from the University of Ottawa. He completed his residency and did further training in Transplant Infectious Diseases in Toronto and Boston. Dr Humar’s research interests are in Transplant Infections, with a focus on the prevention and treatment of Cytomegalovirus, along with other opportunistic viruses, as well as the immunologic and virologic determinants of infection. Dr Humar has over 300 publications in these areas. His work was integral to the development of internationally used guidelines related to the management of CMV post-transplant. Dr Humar recently completed his terms as the Director of the Ajmera Transplant Centre at the University Health Network, and as the Director of the University of Toronto Transplant Institute. He is also the Past-President of the Canadian Society of Transplantation. Dr Humar has recently joined The Transplant Society Board as a counselor.   

We acknowledge that the conference is being held the traditional lands of the Ngunnawal people. We recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples' continuing connection to land, water, and community and we pay our respects to Elders past and present. ASHM acknowledges Sovereignty in this country has never been ceded. It always was, and always will be, Aboriginal land.