Dr. Rashidul Haque has over 32 years of research experience, primarily managing longitudinal cohort studies in Bangladesh in collaboration with US institutions, particularly the University of Virginia, University of Vermont and Boston Children’s Hospital. Currently, he is leading the Emerging Infections and Parasitology Laboratory at icddr,b under the Infectious Disease Division. For the past 30 years, he has closely collaborated with Prof. Charles Nelson from the University of Virginia, serving as PI and Co-PI on several major studies, including the BEAN  study, BEAN Follow-up study and  LEAP study. I have also served as a PI in several studies : PROVIDE clinical trial for rotavirus and polio vaccines, the Mal-ED study, and multiple NIH-funded projects like the Auranofin clinical trial for GI protozoa and studies on cryptosporidiosis and household transmission of infections.

He is also leading a Phase II dengue vaccine challenge trial in Bangladesh with the University of Vermont and have been involved with the Global Network of Child and Maternal Health since 2018, working on a maternal and neonatal health registry. He has published over 300 peer-reviewed papers and received the International Research Scholars award from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in 2001.

Charles A. Nelson III, is currently professor of pediatrics and neuroscience and professor of psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and professor of education in the Harvard Graduate School of Education. He also holds the Richard David Scott Chair in Pediatric Developmental Medicine Research at Boston Children’s Hospital, and serves as director of research in the Division of Developmental Medicine. 

His research interests center on a variety of problems in developmental cognitive neuroscience, including: the development of social perception; developmental trajectories to autism; and the effects of early adversity on brain and behavioral development. He chaired the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Early Experience and Brain Development and served on the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) panels that wrote From Neurons to Neighborhoods, and New Directions in Child Abuse and Neglect Research. Among his many honors he has received the Leon Eisenberg award from Harvard Medical School, an honorary Doctorate from Bucharest University (Romania), was a resident fellow at the Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio (Italy) Center, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, the British Academy and along with Professors Fox and Zeanah has received the Ruane Prize for Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Research from the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation. In 2021 he received the Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize.

Dr. Talat Shama, with over a decade of experience in both medical and research fields, is currently a Research Investigator at the Emerging Infections and Parasitology Laboratory under the Infectious Disease Division at icddr,b. She has extensive experience in clinical and field-based research and has contributed to numerous high-impact projects aimed at enhancing public health outcomes.

Her research focuses on the brain and nervous system, particularly their effects on behavior, cognition, and mental health, utilizing advanced techniques such as EEG, fMRI, fNIRS, and sMRI. Dr. Shama has co-authored approximately 10 peer-reviewed papers and has collaborated with esteemed institutions such as Boston Children’s Hospital and the University of Auckland. She has also been involved in research projects funded by NIH, Wellcome Trust, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Dr. Jasmine Siew is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Boston Children's Hospital, affiliated with Harvard Medical School. Her research focuses on pediatric neuroscience, with an emphasis on neurodevelopmental disorders and brain imaging techniques. Dr. Siew has contributed to several high-impact studies and collaborates closely with multidisciplinary teams to advance understanding of childhood brain development and related clinical interventions. She holds a PhD in Neuroscience and has a strong background in both clinical and translational research.