DICI Directory

Simon Dunham Laboratory

Simon Dunham
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Simon Dunham, Ph.D.
  • Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering in Radiology

Professor Dunham’s research focuses on the use of soft materials, 3D printing and nontraditional electronic fabrication to realize novel biomedical technologies.  He has a B.S. in materials science from the Georgia Institute of Technology and a Ph.D. in materials science from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana.  His current research focuses on cardiac imaging, cardiac electrophysiology and airway interventions.

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Abdellatif Ait Lahcen, Ph.D.
  • Postdoctoral Associate in Radiology
Abdellatif Ait Lahcen, Ph.D., is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Weill Cornell Medicine, developing soft robotic sensors for mapping heart arrhythmias. Previously a postdoc at KAUST in Saudi Arabia, he earned his Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry from Hassan II University in Morocco in 2018, researching electrochemical and optical biosensors. He has authored and co-authored over 35 publications, 3 book chapters, and 1 US patent, with over 1500 citations and an h-index of 22. He serves on the editorial boards of several analytical chemistry journals and is a member of multiple professional societies. His work has been recognized through awards, including Best Oral Communication at the 2019 Euroanalysis XX conference in Istanbul, Turkey.
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Lina Sanchez Botero, Ph.D.
  • Postdoctoral Associate in Radiology

Lina Sanchez Botero, Ph.D., is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Weill Cornell Medicine developing novel soft robotic methods for ablation of cardiac tissue to treat arrhythmias of the heart.

Mousumi Dhara
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Mousumi Dhara
  • Laboratory Supervisor in Radiology

Mousumi Dhara manages purchasing, regulatory affairs and operations for the Biomedical Engineering and Brain Health Imaging Institute in the Department of Radiology. Prior to this, she was the biorepository coordinator in the Head and Neck Cancer Division at Johns Hopkins University, and in Tissue Procurement Services at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Department of Pathology. 

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Alexander Dornback, B.S.E.
  • Research Technician I in Radiology

The research of Alex Dornback, B.S.E., focuses on 3D modeling, printing, and fluid dynamic assessment of patient-specific coronary artery models. He received his bachelor's degree in biomedical engineering from Case Western Reserve University with a concentration in biomechanics. Previously, he held a scientist role at Haima Therapeutics formulating and testing platelet-mimetic nanoparticles to prevent life-threatening bleeding, and has worked on other academic research in wearables and software development.

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Sahar Jalal, Ph.D.
  • Postdoctoral Associate in Radiology

Dr. Jalal’s research centers around characterizing the biomechanical properties of diseased coronary arteries, with the goal of replicating them via 3D printing. She received her Ph.D. in aerospace engineering and mechanics from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, where her thesis was on respiratory flows in idealized and patient-specific 3D-printed human airways. Her interests include fluid mechanics, biomechanics, Magnetic Resonance Velocimetry (MRV), medical devices and public health.  

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Laya Sam, M.D.
  • Research Associate in Radiology

Laya Sam, M.D., is an OBGYN surgeon who assists with various projects involving ex vivo and in vivo animal testing, performing medical image annotations, and interacting with patients for IRB-approved human studies.

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Lilia Soriano
  • Research Assistant in Radiology

Lilia Soriano is working as a research lab assistant in the Dalio Institute for Cardiovascular Imaging. She graduated from Queens College with a bachelor's degree in chemistry and a concentration in biochemistry.  

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Zixu Huang, Ph.D.
  • Postdoctoral Associate in Radiology

The research of Zixu Huang, Ph.D., focuses on the design and processing of functional polymers, soft robotics, and flexible electronics to advance innovative biomedical technologies. He has a B.S. in composite materials and engineering from East China University of Science and Technology and a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of Houston. His current research is dedicated to the development of smart endotracheal tubings for patients with respiratory challenges.

Bobak Mosadegh Laboratory

Bobak Mosadegh Photo
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Bobak Mosadegh, Ph.D.
  • Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering in Radiology
  • DICI Director

Bobak Mosadegh received his B.S. and M.S. in biomedical engineering from the University of California, Irvine.  He performed undergraduate and graduate-level research in Professor Noo Li Jeon’s lab, working on gradient-generating microfluidic devices. Dr. Mosadegh received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor while working in the lab of Shuichi Takayama.  His research involved developing microfluidic integrated circuits and various cell patterning methods using aqueous two-phase systems and microfluidic devices.  Under the guidance of George M. Whitesides, Dr. Mosadegh performed his postdoctoral training at Harvard University and the Wyss Institute of Biologically Inspired Engineering.  His research focused on developing two technologies, i) a 3D paper-based cell culture system for the study of the effects of ischemic gradients on cancer cells and cardiomyocytes, and ii) actuators and control systems for soft robotics. Dr. Mosadegh started as an assistant professor in the department of radiology, Weill Cornell Medicine (WCM), in Nov. 2014. He is currently an associate professor. He is a member of the Dalio Institute of Cardiovascular Imaging, and convener for the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) working group on cardiac occluders.

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Mohsen Annabestani, Ph.D.
  • Postdoctoral Associate in Radiology

Mohsen Annabestani, Ph.D., earned his M.S. in biomedical engineering from Ferdowsi University of Mashhad in 2013 and his Ph.D. in electrical engineering in 2018, both focusing on soft actuators. During his Ph.D., he spent six months at Harvard University researching soft robotic catheters. From 2018 to 2021, he worked at Sharif University of Technology, contributing to soft sensors, actuators, biosensors, wearable devices, and microfluidics, while supervising B.S. and M.S. students. In 2021, Dr. Annabestani joined the Bioinspired Soft Robotics group at the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia as a postdoctoral research fellow, collaborating on designing growing robots inspired by plant movement. Currently, he is a postdoctoral research associate at Weill Cornell Medicine, focusing on mixed reality visualization for cardiac interventions and soft robotics for biomedical applications. With expertise in biomedical engineering and artificial intelligence, Dr. Annabestani aims to address healthcare challenges by integrating soft robotic systems with intelligent algorithms and signal processing. He has also lectured on electric circuits, signal processing, machine learning, and engineering mathematics.

Mousumi Dhara
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Mousumi Dhara
  • Laboratory Supervisor in Radiology

Mousumi Dhara manages purchasing, regulatory affairs and operations for the Biomedical Engineering and Brain Health Imaging Institute in the Department of Radiology. Prior to this, she was the biorepository coordinator in the Head and Neck Cancer Division at Johns Hopkins University, and in Tissue Procurement Services at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Department of Pathology. 

Alexandre Caprio
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Alexandre Caprio
  • Research Associate in Radiology

Alex Caprio obtained his M.S. in biomedical engineering from the Faculty of Medicine in Nancy, France. He subsequently had several internships and positions, providing him expertise in medical device development and testing. While at the Dalio Institute, he has acquired skills in 3D printing, image segmentation, image analysis, computer-aided design, soft robotics and stretchable electronics. He contributes to most projects in the labs of both Dr. Mosadegh and Simon Dunham.  

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Sepehr Janghorbani, Ph.D.
  • Postdoctoral Associate in Radiology
Sepehr Janghorbani, Ph.D., is a postdoctoral associate at Weill Cornell Medical College and the DALIO Institute. Before this, he obtained his Ph.D. from the computer science department of Rutgers University under the supervision of Gerard De Melo. Sepehr’s research lies at the intersection of deep learning, computer vision, and natural language processing. His research spans a wide range of topics in machine learning, including self-supervised learning and its applications in visual and language understanding, probabilistic generative modeling, multimodal vision-language models, and the evaluation and mitigation of biases in AI models. He is currently focusing on the design and development of deep generative models, with a particular emphasis on medical data applications. Before starting his Ph.D., Sepehr earned his B.Sc. in computer engineering from Sharif University of Technology. In addition to his academic work, he has been part of machine learning research and development teams at prominent companies, including Apple, Disney Research, and Dataminr, contributing to the design and development of various self-supervised vision and language understanding models. Sepehr’s scholarly work has been published in top conferences and journals, including ICLR, NAACL, EACL, and AAMAS. He also serves as a peer reviewer for several conferences and journals, including ACL, ICLR, AAAI, EMNLP, EACL, TIP, and TCSVT, and as a program committee member for the Web Conference.