BOARD
Dagna Sheerar: President
Dagna Sheerar is the director of the University of Wisconsin Carbone Cancer Center Flow Cytometry Laboratory. Dagna’s favorite flow cytometry activities include designing high-parameter immunophenotyping panels, analyzing data (both flow and facility usage data), training and educating new cytometrists, consulting with researchers about their cytometry assays and data analysis work flows, rigor and reproducibility, evaluating, procuring, and installing fancy new cytometry instruments, and procrastinating on the monthly Flow Lab billing by discussing the theory of anything remotely related to flow cytometry with anyone who will listen. Realistically, the bulk of her time is spent on core operations; services and resources offered, educational content and customer training, continuing education for core staff, and leveraging core contributions to research toward institutional support.
Dagna has been working in, managing and directing Flow Cytometry Shared Resource Laboratories since 2000, both at the University of Wisconsin – Madison and at the University of Western Ontario. She is a Certified Cytometrist actively involved in the Great Lakes International Imaging and Flow Cytometry Association (GLIIFCA), the International Society for the Advancement of Cytometry (ISAC), the Association of Biomolecular Resources (ABRF), and serves on the Board of Cytometry Educational Associates, Inc. (CEAI), as President. Dagna has been involved in hosting and teaching at the Annual Course since 2019.
Yoav Altman: Vice President
Yoav Altman holds a B.A. degree in Integrative Biology from the University of California at Berkeley. He is Director of the Flow Cytometry Shared Resource at Sanford Burnham Prebys where he has guided many hundreds of researchers in the use of flow and imaging cytometry during his 23-year tenure. Since 2017, Yoav has held a Specialist in Cytometry Certification from the American Society for Clinical Pathology Board of Certification. For a recent project he devised an image analysis algorithm to identify and quantitate a new class of neutrophil-derived extracellular vesicles elevated in plasma from septic patients. Yoav particularly enjoys the creativity involved in image analysis and in 2019 organized Southern California’s first symposium on Imaging Flow Cytometry. In 2023, he was involved in hosting and organizing the 46th Annual Course in Cytometry.
Cheryl Kim: Secretary
Cheryl Kim is currently the Senior Director of the Flow Cytometry Core Facility at the La Jolla Institute for Immunology, where she has worked for the last 18 years. She received her undergraduate degree in Biochemistry & Cell Biology from the University of California, San Diego and has been in the field of cytometry for over 24 years. In addition to providing education, extensive training and assistance to many researchers, Cheryl has been fortunate to work with early access instrumentation and has successfully implemented novel, high parameter technology at LJI. She is co-founder and co-organizer of the San Diego Society for Cytometry (SDSC), a local cytometry users group with over 300 members and a member of the International Society for Advancement of Cytometry (ISAC) since 2002. More recently, she joined Cytometry Educational Associates, Inc. as a Board member and Secretary, in addition to being an instructor for the well-renowned Annual Course in Cytometry, taking place in rotating locations including San Diego. Outside of work, Cherylloves to spend time with her two boys and is a volunteer/leader for the Sierra Club San Diego Chapter.
Alex Henkel: Treasurer
Alex Henkel received his B.S. in Biochemistry from UW-Madison. He is the Shared Resources Manager for the University of Wisconsin Carbone Cancer Center where he supports the operations and strategic direction for 17 shared resource facilities. His journey in flow cytometry began at Spherotech, Inc. developing microparticles for flow cytometry applications. Prior to his current appointment, he spent 7 years in the UWCCC Flow Cytometry Facility as an Instrumentation Technologist, where he trained and assisted numerous researchers using the facility. He attended the Annual Course in Cytometry in 2018 and has been involved in its planning and execution since 2019, as an organizer, host, instructor, board member, and treasurer.
Jennifer Hope: Director
Jenna Hope is an Assistant Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at Drexel University in the College of Medicine where she also serves as Co-Director of the College of Medicine Flow Cytometry Core Facility. She graduated from Ursinus College in 2010 with a BS in Biology in and from Drexel University College of Medicine in 2017 with a PhD in Microbiology and Immunology, where she was first introduced to flow cytometry. She completed her postdoctoral fellowship studying Cancer Immunology at Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute. Her research lab regularly uses high parameter multicolor flow cytometry to study immune responses to cancer and chronic virus infections.
Paul K Wallace: Director
Paul K. Wallace, served from 2003-2021 as Director of the Flow and Image Cytometry Department and currently Professor Emeritus at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center RPCCC) in Buffalo, NY. He is the current Educator in Chief and a Past President of the International Society for Advancement of Cytometry, an organization with over 2,000 members, and the Chief Scientific Officer of SciGro, Inc., a biomedical consulting group. He is active in the International Clinical Cytometry Society, Associate Editor of Clinical Cytometry B, and the 2018 recipient of their Wallace H. Coulter award for lifetime achievement in clinical cytometry.
Before joining Roswell Park, Dr. Wallace was an Assistant Professor of Immunology at Dartmouth Medical School, Hanover NH (1993-2003), a cofounder of Zynaxis Cell Science, Inc., Malvern PA (1988-1991), and the Supervisor of Flow Cytometry at SmithKline (now Quest) Clinical Laboratories King of Prussia, PA (SKCL; 1979-1988). He is internationally recognized for his commitment to flow cytometric education and has been a member of ISAC’s Educational Task Force/Committee since its inception in 2006 and of the ICCS Education Committee since 2003. He has been on the faculty of the Bowdoin/New Mexico/U. of Wisconsin Annual Course in Methods and Applications of Cytometry since 1994.
Katharine A. Muirhead: Director
Kathy earned a B.S in Chemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Ph.D. in Inorganic Chemistry from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Following post-doctoral fellowships in biochemistry and tumor biology, she joined the Pathology faculty at the University of Rochester, where she got hooked on the emerging discipline of flow cytometry. She subsequently served as director of the first flow cytometry core facility at SmithKline Beckman R&D, and as Senior V.P. of Research & Business Development at Zynaxis, Inc., a cell therapy start-up co-founded with colleagues from SmithKline. Since 1996, Kathy has been Chief Operating Officer of SciGro, Inc., a biomedical consultancy co-founded with Dr. Betsy Ohlsson-Wilhelm.
Kathy has served as an ISAC Councilor, Associate Editor and reviewer for Cytometry, Adjunct Professor at the Thomas Jefferson University School of Health Professions in Philadelphia, and on CLSI subcommittees developing guidelines for clinical immunophenotyping of normal and neoplastic leukocytes and for validation of flow cytometric assays. Together with Kylie Price and Paul Wallace, she co-authored the Proliferation Monitoring course offered by ISAC’s online CYTO University. As a co-founder and faculty member of the internationally recognized Annual Courses in Cytometry, she loves interacting with, teaching, and learning from cytometrists from around the world. Her research interests include cell-based immunotherapies for cancer and autoimmune diseases, and novel methods for monitoring cell trafficking and function.
