Our course instructor is passionate about basic science research and helping medical students match into residency. He enrolled in the University of Pittsburgh’s Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP), where he pursued both an MD in the School of Medicine and a PhD in the School of Engineering. He has served on the admissions committee as a student representative for the School of Medicine, the Medical Scientist Training Program (MD/PhD Program) and the Swanson School of Engineering’s Department of Bioengineering.

He has conducted nearly 100 student interviews over the course of his training and has over 15 years of experience in the development, characterization and testing of biomimetic biomaterials, artificial organs and tissue engineered constructs. Throughout his graduate studies, he was the primary grant writer on grants of nearly 2 million dollars from the Department of Defense, National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Pennsylvania Commonwealth. In addition to writing grants for his own projects, he is often tasked with reviewing/critiquing grants/proposals and fellowship applications for peers.

He is currently training as an Integrated Plastic Surgery Resident at the University of Pittsburgh. He has published his work in journals such as Science Advances and the Proceedings of the Notational Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS).