Dr. Chandra P. Sharma is Adjunct Professor, Department of Pharmaceutical Biotechnology, Manipal College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Manipal University, and Hon. Emeritus Professor, College of Biomedical Engineering & Applied Sciences, Purbanchal University, Kathmandu, Nepal. Dr. Sharma is a Solid-State Physicist from IIT Delhi and received his training in Biomaterials area in the University of Utah with Prof. D.J. Lyman as a graduate student and in the University of Liverpool, England with Prof. D.F. Williams as a Post-Doctoral Research Associate. Dr. Sharma has been awarded FBSE (Fellow Biomaterials Science & Engineering) by The International Union of Societies for Biomaterials Science & Engineering (IUS-BSE) in 2008 and FBAO (Fellow Biomaterials and Artificial Organs) by Society for Biomaterials & Artificial Organs (India) (SBAOI) in 2011 and shares Whitaker and National Science Foundation Award – International Society for Artificial Organs (ISAO) USA, invited member ACS (2015-2018). Dr. Vinoy Thomas is an Associate Professor and Graduate Program Director in the Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He also holds secondary appointments at the Department of Biomedical Engineering, Department of Physics and Department of Environmental Science & Health. Dr. Thomas is also an Associate Scientist at the Center for Nanoscale Materials and Biointegration (CNMB) and Center for Clinical and Translational Sciences (CCTS). After his PhD in Biomaterials & Technology, he completed postdoctoral training at Friedrich-Schiller University (FSU), Jena, Germany, and at the National Institute of Standards & Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, USA. His research focuses on biomaterials processing-property relationships, nanomaterials for tissue engineering and drug delivery . He has published over 120 scientific research and review articles (h- index: 36), co-edited two books (Tissue Engineering, Elsevier 2022 and Artificial Intelligence in Tissue and Organ Regeneration, Elsevier 2023). He serves as Associate Editor of Heliyon (Engineering). Dr. Thomas received Fellow Awards such as FBAO -from Society for Biomaterials and Artificial Organs India, FAAS- from Alabama Academy of Sciences, and IAAM Scientist Medal from International Association of Advanced Materials, Sweden. Dr. Thomas is currently serving as the President of Alabama Academy of Science (AAS), Chairman of SBAOI- North American Chapter, and Secretary of Biomaterials Committee of The Minerals, Metals, and Materials Society (TMS). Arie Nakhmani joined the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering as an assistant professor in 2013. Prior to that, he completed his postdoctoral training at Georgia Tech and Boston University. He is an Associate Scientist in the Comprehensive Cancer Center, and director of ANRY lab at the UAB. He is the author of over 90 peer-reviewed research articles and book chapters on robust control, machine learning, and signal and image analysis. Rachel June Smith joined the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Neuroengineering Program as an assistant professor in August 2022. She completed her Ph.D. with Dr. Beth Lopour at UC Irvine in 2019. Her doctoral work focused on the development of computational metrics in scalp EEG data that reflected disease burden and predicted response to treatment in patients with infantile spasms (IS), a potentially devastating epileptic encephalopathy. Rachel completed her postdoctoral training at Johns Hopkins University with Dr. Sridevi Sarma, where she used dynamical systems and control theory techniques to localize the onset of seizures in the epileptic brain from intracranial EEG recordings during single-pulse electrical stimulation. As an assistant professor at UAB, Rachel will continue to collaborate with expert neurologists and use her computational skills to develop novel measures of therapeutic response in patients with neurodegenerative disorders.
