Plenary Session Presenters

Dan is a former NASA astronaut and a veteran of three space flights, four spacewalks and two trips to the International Space Station. He retired from NASA in 2005 and started his own company, Denbar Robotics that creates robotic assistants for home and commercial use, concentrating on assistive devices for people with disabilities. He received numerous honors. A few of them are the following: 2000 and 2002 NASA Exceptional Service Medals, 2001 Top 10 in the world career spacewalk hours, 100 Most Notable Princeton Graduate School Alumni of the 20th Century, Harvard Medical School Paul J, Corcoran Award and honorary doctoral degrees from Beloit College and St. Louis University. Dan is also a frequent speaker and has given keynote addresses to audiences throughout the world.

Derek van der Kooy is a Professor in Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto. His work on neural stem cells in the adult mammalian forebrain (Neuron, 1994), and the first report of stem cells in the adult mammalian eye (Science, 2000) are among his more than 185 publications in peer-reviewed journals. Derek's lab continues to investigate the nature of stem cells, embryonic and adult, the concept of immortal cells, and the differentiation of embryonic stem cells, which are capable of forming any tissue in the body, to neural stem cells.

June Isaacson Kailes is consultant and a disability rights advocate. Respected and recognized nationally and internationally, she is one of the original national leaders in the Independent Living Movement. June is an Adjunct Associate Professor and the Associate Director of the Center for Disability Issues and the Health Professions at Western University of Health Sciences, Pomona, California. June has operated a consulting practice since 1978. She works locally, nationally and internationally as a consultant, writer and trainer. She has delivered hundreds of keynote addresses, workshops and seminars. June writes, speaks and educates from practical "hands-on" experience and over three decades of research and training. Her areas of consulting include health, wellness and aging with disability, and emergency preparedness for and with people with disabilities and activity limitations.

Richard Henderson, is currently Professor of Orthopaedics and Pediatrics at the University of North Carolina. He received his PhD (in Physiology) and MD degrees from the University of Chicago, and then completed his orthopaedic residency at the University of Iowa. He has been a clinically active Pediatric Orthopaedic surgeon on the medical school faculty at the University of North Carolina since 1985.

Dr. Henderson's busy clinical practice covers the full range of pediatric orthopaedic conditions including such things as clubfoot, neuromuscular disorders, hip dysplasia, pediatric trauma, and spinal deformities. His primary research interest for nearly 2 decades has focused on the impact of various medical and physical conditions on skeletal growth and development, particularly as it relates to bone density and skeletal fragility. He was a founding member of the North American Growth in Cerebral Palsy Project, which is a clinical research collaboration that has investigated multiple issues related to growth, nutrition, and health in children with CP. He has over 70 peer-review publications, and his research has received support from the United Cerebral Palsy Research and Education Foundation, the NIH, and several other agencies.

Mindy Lipson Aisen was named Director and CEO of the United Cerebral Palsy Research and Educational Foundation now known as the Cerebral Palsy International Research Foundation in September 2005. Dr. Aisen graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (BS mechanical engineering) and the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons (MD). She completed post doctoral clinical training in Neurology at The New York Hospital/Cornell University, and is Board Certified in Neurology. She remained on faculty at Cornell and became Associate Professor and Director of Spinal Injury. Dr. Aisen is a former member of the Board of Directors of the American Society of Experimental Neural Therapeutics and the Board of Directors of the American Academy of Neurology. She is former President of the American Society of Neurologic Rehabilitation and is currently a Director on the Board of the ASNR Foundation.

State of Rehabilitation Technology: Robotic Technology to Improve Gait in Children with Cerebral Palsy
Paolo Bonato serves as Director of the Motion Analysis Laboratory at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, Boston, MA, he is Assistant Professor in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Harvard Medical School, and he is member of the Affiliated Faculty of the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology.

Dr. Bonato is IEEE Senior Member, IEEE EMBS AdCom elected member, and VP of the International Society of Electrophysiology and Kinesiology. He serves as Chair of the IEEE EMBS Technical Committee on Wearable Biomedical Sensors and Systems.

Dr. Bonato has co-authored about 40 research papers and 130 conference proceedings. His research work is focused on robotic and wearable technologies and their application in physical medicine and rehabilitation.

Dr. Kamala Gullapalli Cotts graduated from Northwestern University Medical School in 1991. She completed her internal medicine residency at the University of Iowa in 1994. She has provided primary care for adults with developmental disabilities since 1997 at the University of Iowa and since 1999 at the University of Chicago. Dr. Cotts has a clinic for developmentally disabled adults called the Adult Developmental Disabilities Clinic. She has a curriculum for internal medicine and medicine pediatrics residents on providing primary care for these individuals. Dr. Cotts also completed an Ethics fellowship in 2006 and now attends on the Ethics Consult service. She teaches ethics fellows on end of life issues in adults with developmental disabilities. She has a particular interest in the transition of individuals with developmental disabilities as they cross the threshold in to adulthood.

Margaret A. Turk, MD is Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and Pediatrics at the State University of New York Upstate Medical University in Syracuse and Program Director for the Pediatric Rehabilitation Medicine fellowship at SUNY UMU. She has been active in many national professional and research organizations and agencies to promote research and dissemination of information regarding health for those with lifelong disabilities and the importance of health promotion in disability. Her research, publications, and national and international presentations have focused on these areas, in particular regarding adults with cerebral palsy. She is Co-Editor of the Disability and Health Journal and Associate Editor of Pediatric Rehabilitation Medicine Journal. She has been recognized for her contributions through national awards and lectureships.

Hans Forssberg, MD, PhD is Professor in Basic and Clinical Neuroscience at Karolinska Institutet and Consultant Pediatric Neurologist at Astrid Lindgren Children's Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden. He is currently Vice President at KI and Director of Stockholm Brain Institute and Chairman of the European Academy of Childhood Disability.

Hans Forssberg started his research career in basic neuroscience. In parallel with the clinical training in pediatrics, HF initiated studies on the development of motor control for locomotion, posture and fine hand skills in typically developing children and children with neurodevelopmental disorders. Together with Ehrsson he was the first to describe the bilateral frontal-parietal-cerebellar system for precise finger control in a series of highly cited articles. HF was also first to show that the motor problems in cerebral palsy mainly are due to deficient development of central motor coordination, and not spasticity. Together with Eliasson he has developed and studied several new intervention methods based on motor training and learning. Together with Ullén, he has for the first time shown that training of fine motor skills (piano playing) early during childhood (i.e., < 11 years), affects the development of the white matter in the cortico-spinal tract. Together with Klingberg he described deficits in spatial working memory in children with ADHD, and participated in the development of cognitive training methods improving working memory function and reducing the ADHD symptoms. This collaboration recently led to a breakthrough Science article showing that improvement of the training is associated with alteration in dopamine transmission in the human brain, i.e., up- or down-regulation of dopamine D1 receptors.