Prof. Michal Schwartz Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel

Michal Schwartz is the Maurice and Ilse Katz Professorial Chair in Neuroimmunology at the Weizmann Institute for Science. Schwartz's work focuses on the role of innate and adaptive immunity in central nervous system (CNS) plasticity in health and disease. She was the world pioneer in demonstrating that blood macrophages are... read moreneeded for spinal cord repair, against the dogma that infiltration of immune cells to the central nervous system should be mitigated. Schwartz has received a number of prestigious awards for her research, including the 2002 Friedenwald Award from ARVO (Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology), for her outstanding contribution to vision research and ophthalmology. Professor Schwartz has been invited as a keynote lecturer in numerous international meetings, and is an elected member of the International and European Societies for Neuroimmunology.