Dr. Witschey is a NIH/NHLBI K99 fellow trainee in cardiovascular disease.

His research interests include the development of engineering, noncontrast and molecular imaging methods for heart failure, heart failure mechanics and hemodynamics.

He earned a PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics from the University of Pennsylvania and a Physics degree from the University of Virginia.

He recently completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Medical Physics from the University Medical Center in Freiburg, Germany, where he developed methods for advanced magnetic resonance imaging with Professor Juergen Hennig and Dr. Maxim Zaitsev.

Dr. Melissa Levack graduated from Dartmouth College in 2001 and attended Emory University School of Medicine where she received her M.D. in 2007.  She is currently a general surgery resident at Massachusetts General Hospital and is pursuing a career in cardiothoracic surgery.

Dr. Levack is completing a research fellowship in the Gorman lab as part of her residency training.  Her research interests include aortic valve modeling with three-dimensional echocardiography, aortic strain analysis using speckle-tracking algorithms and 4D flow analysis using MRI. In addition, she collects and maintains our 3D echo human database from images acquired at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. Kondo graduated from Hirosaki University School of Medicine, Japan, where he received his M.D. in 1999. After 3 years residency, he earned a Ph.D. from Hirosaki University School of Medicine in 2005. He then worked as a clinical cardiac surgery for 5 years--two of which were done under the supervision of Kenji Takahashi, M.D., Ph.D.

Dr. Kondo's clinical interests and specialties are ischemic cardiac disease and acquired valvular diseases. His research interests include chronic post-infarction left ventricular remodeling and mitral valve dysfunction. His research in the Gorman Cardiovascular Research Group is directed towards ventricular remodeling and minimally invasive surgical device development as an exchange research scholar and senior surgeon.

Jeremy R. McGarvey, M.D graduated highest honors from Lehigh University in 2004 with a B.S. in Behavioral Neuroscience.  Dr. McGarvey subsequently worked at Merck & Co. in the Department of Biotechnology, where he researched high-throughput/high-content screening techniques using automated cell handling/imaging.  Jeremy earned an M.D. from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine in 2008 and was actively involved in cardiac surgery device design and surgical robotics research (PI: Marco Zenati, M.D. & Howie Choset, Ph.D.).  Dr. McGarvey is currently a general surgery resident at the University of Pennsylvania with plans to pursue academic cardiovascular surgery.  He is currently completing a 2-year research fellowship in the Gorman Cardiovascular Research Group.  Jeremy's research interests include novel surgical and endovascular device design and MRI-based evaluation of flow and function in heart failure.

Dr. Toru Shimaoka earned his M.D. from Oita University School of Medicine in 1998. He is a fully trained, board certified cardiovascular surgeon from Japan. He has 9 years of cardiothoracic surgical experience and 3 years of rodent surgical research experience. Dr. Shimaoka worked as a staff physician in the Department of Cardiovascular Surgery in Oita University Hospital prior to joining the Gorman Research Lab in 2011. His research interests include novel surgical/endovascular device design and valve modeling with 3D echocardiography. 

Eric Shang, M.D. graduated from Swarthmore College in 2004 and received degrees in Mathematics and Economics.  He attended the University of Maryland School of Medicine is currently in his fourth year of a general surgery residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. 

His current research interests include active-contour image segmentation, and finite element stress analysis of the abdominal and thoracic aortas.