Associate Professor Elie Matar is a dual-trained consultant neurologist and sleep physician, and a Horizon Fellow at the University of Sydney. He leads the Sleep Neurology and Movement Disorders Services at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and practises clinically at the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research in Sydney with a particular interest in neurological sleep disorders. As an NHMRC Emerging Leadership Fellow, he leads a research program, which investigates how disturbances of sleep and arousal contribute to cognitive decline, delirium and neurodegenerative disease. His particular focus is on Lewy body disorders and isolated REM sleep behaviour disorder in which he is a recognised international authority. He is the ASA representative on the RACP Respiratory and Sleep Medicine Advanced Training Committee and holds executive and leadership roles across national and international cognitive and movement disorders societies.

Professor Jane Alty is a neurologist and movement disorders specialist at the University of Tasmania and co-lead of the Tasmania Parkinson’s Project. Her research focuses on the early detection and monitoring of Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease using digital biomarkers, genetics and population-based cohorts. She leads statewide and national studies spanning Parkinson’s disease, prodromal disease and dementia, including the ISLAND Sleep Study and a growing cohort of individuals with isolated REM Sleep Behaviour Disorder (iRBD), a key risk state for Parkinson’s disease. Her work integrates clinical phenotyping, digital technologies, biomarkers and genomics to advance earlier diagnosis and precision medicine.

Dr. Raffaele Ferri graduated in Medicine and Surgery from the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Rome in 1981 and specialized in Neurology at the same institution in 1985. He is Scientific Director of the Oasi Research Institute-IRCCS in Troina (Italy) and has been involved in sleep medicine for several decades. His research focuses on sleep medicine across the lifespan, from childhood to adulthood, with particular emphasis on the pathophysiology, clinical characterization, and longitudinal evolution of sleep-related movement disorders, REM sleep behavior disorder, and narcolepsy. Dr. Ferri is currently Past-President of the World Sleep Society and previously served as President of the Italian Sleep Medicine Association (AIMS) from 2015 to 2018. His past leadership roles include Scientific Secretary-Treasurer and Counselor of the Italian Society of Psychophysiology, Secretary of the Federation of the European Psychophysiology Societies, and Counselor of AIMS. He has served as Member-at-Large and Vice-President of the European Restless Legs Syndrome Study Group and as Member-at-Large of the International Restless Legs Syndrome Study Group. Dr. Ferri is Associate Editor of Sleep and the International Journal of Psychophysiology, and has served or currently serves on the Editorial Boards of numerous international scientific journals, including the most important journals in the field of Sleep Medicine. In 2024 he received the Italian Knowledge Leaders Award.