Engineering Medicine Research Summit
Think. Collaborate. Fund.

Event Overview
Date & Time: May 9, 2025, 1 -5 p.m. and May 10, 2025, 9 a.m. – 3 p.m.
Location: EnMed Tower, 1020 Holcombe Blvd., Houston, TX
Format: 10-minute presentations by faculty members from Texas A&M and Houston Methodist; networking opportunities and brainstorming collaborative research projects
Purpose: Foster interdisciplinary collaborations in engineering medicine between Texas A&M University and Houston Methodist faculty.
We plan to fund three collaborative projects as an outcome of this conference. These projects will funded up to $50,000 each.
Register Now
Limited spots
Contact
Dr. Tanmay Lele
tanmay.lele@tamu.edu
Summit Agenda
Friday, May 9, 2025 (Half-Day)
1:00 – 1:10 p.m. | Welcome Address | Dr. Tim Boone, Interim Dean, Texas A&M School of Engineering Medicine | |
1:10 – 1:25 p.m. | Keynote Speaker: Texas A&M’s Research Enterprise: Bridging Engineering and Medicine for Large-Scale Impact | Dr. Joe Elabd, Vice Chancellor for Research, Texas A&M University System | View Biography |
Session 1 | Cardiovascular | ||
1:25 – 1:35 p.m. | Models from IPS-Cardiomyocytes Engineered Tissues, Mouse and Large Animal Models to Study Cardiac Diseases | Francisco Altamirano, PhD | View Biosketch |
1:35 – 1:45 p.m. | Establishing Robust Computational Approaches to Integrate Vascular Biomechanics into the Clinical Setting | Luke Timmins, PhD | View Biosketch |
1:45 – 1:55 p.m. | TBD | Ashutosh Sabharwal, PhD | |
1:55 – 2:05 p.m. | Convergence Engineering: An Organs-on-Chip Approach | Abhishek Jain, PhD | View Biosketch |
2:05 – 2:20 p.m. | Networking Break | ||
Session 2 | Infectious Disease | ||
2:20 – 2:30 p.m. | When Nosocomial Infections Go Rogue: Clinical and Biological Complications | Julian Hurdle, PhD | View Biosketch |
2:30 – 2:40 p.m. | A Translational Approach to Antimicrobial Resistance | Cesar Arias, MD, MSc, PhD | |
2:40 – 2:50 p.m. | Novel Microbial and Host Phenotypes Under Micro-Confinement | Pushkar Lele, PhD | View Biosketch |
2:50 – 3:00 p.m. | A Translational Approach to Understanding Antibiotic Resistance in Healthcare-Associated Gram Negative Pathogens | William Miller, MD | View Biosketch |
3:00 – 3:15 p.m. | Google Innovation Hub | ||
3:15 – 3:45 p.m. | Networking Break | ||
Session 3 | Neurology | ||
3:45 – 3:55 p.m. | Electrical Stimulation for Paralysis: Technology and Therapy | Dimitry Sayenko, MD | View Biography |
3:55 – 4:05 p.m. | Neuroimaging and Brain Stimulation Insights Into Behavior Across the Lifespan | Jessica Bernard, PhD | View Biosketch |
4:05 – 4:15 p.m. | Targeting the Adaptive Immune System in Neurodegenerative Disorders | Alireza Faridar, MD | View Biosketch |
4:15 – 4:25 p.m. | Mechanics and Measurement of Neural Signals | Ashutosh Agrawal, PhD | View Biosketch |
4:30 – 5:00 p.m. | Networking and Adjournment |
Saturday, May 10, 2025 (Full Day)
9:00 – 9:10 a.m. | Welcome Back Address | Dr. Tim Boone, Interim Dean, Texas A&M School of Engineering Medicine | |
9:10 – 9:25 a.m. | Keynote Speaker | John Cooke, MD, PhD | |
Session 4 | Cardiovascular | ||
9:25 – 9:35 a.m. | Heart Failure Recovery is a Microvascular Recovery | John Cooke, MD, PhD | View Biosketch |
9:35 – 9:45 a.m. | Mechanics-informed AI to detect and predict soft tissue remodeling | Reza Avaz, PhD | View Biosketch |
9:45 – 9:55 a.m. | Bio-integrated Electronics Enabled by Freestanding Semiconductor Membranes | Jiho Shin, PhD | View Biosketch |
9:55 – 10:05 a.m. | Beyond the Blindspot: Engineering Precision Vascular Interventions | Trisha Roy, MD | View Biosketch |
10:05 – 10:15 a.m | Leveraging AI to Understand the Exposome-Health Interconnections | Sadeer Al-Kindi, MD | View Biosketch |
10:15 – 10:45 a.m. | Networking Break | ||
Session 5 | Neurology | ||
10:45 – 10:55 a.m. | Brain and Gut Communication and Therapy for Head Injury | Sonia Villapol, PhD | View Biosketch |
10:55 – 11:05 a.m. | Protein Engineering for Immunomodulation | Yubin Zhou, MD, PhD, FAIMBE | View Biosketch |
11:05 – 11:15 a.m. | The Texas A&M Drug Discovery and Development Resource Center @CRB | Reid Powell, PhD | View Biography |
11:15 – 11:25 a.m. | Porcine Model of Glioblastoma and the Electrome | Robert Rostomily, MD | View Biosketch |
11:25 – 11:45 a.m. | Networking Break | ||
Session 6 | Cancer | ||
11:45 – 11:55 a.m. | Noninvasive Quantitative Imaging Markers for Personalized Cancer Treatments | Raffaella Righetti, PhD | View Biosketch |
11:55 – 12:05 p.m. | Biophysical Modeling of the Tumor-Immune Interaction | Jason T. George, MD, PhD | View Biosketch |
12:05 – 12:15 p.m. | Integrating Spatial and Single-cell Transcriptomics to Characterize the Tumor Microenvironment | Keith Syson Chan, MD | View Biosketch |
12:15 – 12:25 p.m. | Google Innovation Hub | ||
12:25 – 1:15 p.m. | Lunch & Networking | ||
Session 7 | Cancer | ||
1:15 – 1:25 p.m. | High Throughput Single Cell Functional Assays for the Prediction of Therapeutic Outcomes | Shu-Hsia Chen, PhD | View Biosketch |
1:25 – 1:35 p.m. | Phage-Displayed Macrocyclic Peptides for Drug Discovery | Wenshe Ray Liu, PhD | View Biography |
1:35 – 1:45 p.m. | Systems Medicine and Bioengineering Research at Houston Methodist | Raksha Raghunathan, PhD | |
1:45 – 2:15 p.m. | Networking Break | ||
Session 8 | Infectious Disease | ||
2:15 – 2:25 p.m. | Microfluidic Models for Host-Microbiota Interactions in Colorectal Cancer | Arul Jayaraman, PhD | View Biosketch |
2:25 – 2:35 p.m. | Antimicrobial Drug Discovery and the Role of Academic Labs | Lefteris Mylonakis, MD, PhD | View Biosketch |
2:35 – 2:45 p.m. | Objective-driven AI in Computational Systems Biology across Modalities and Scales | Xiaoning Qian, PhD | View Biosketch |
2:45 – 2:55 p.m. | Closing Remarks & Adjournment | Dr. Tanmay Lele, Senior Associate Dean of Engineering and Research |