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Current Team
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Vladimir Pekar, PhD - Research Scientist
Past: University of Hamburg Vladimir Pekar received a Diploma in Computer Science from Taganrog Radio Engineering Institute in Russia and a PhD degree in Computer Science from the University of Hamburg, Germany. He started his career at Philips Research in Hamburg, working on medical analysis applications, and subsequently held different positions at Philips in Germany and Canada, where he managed academic research collaborations until 2018. Vladimir is joining the team from Perimeter Medical Imaging AI, where as AI Lead he played a pivotal role in development of its proprietary AI technology for OCT image analysis. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Cassis |
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Kevan Bell, PhD - Postdoctoral Fellow
Past: University of Alberta Kevan Bell joined the PhotoMedicine Labs as a postdoctoral fellow after completing his PhD in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Alberta. He had previously moved to the Waterloo Region in 2018 to work in the lab’s spin-off company, illumiSonics Inc., serving as Engineering Director while completing his thesis work. Kevan has played a pivotal role in the development of photoacoustic remote sensing (PARS®) microscopy and has contributed to the majority of currently published academic investigations on the topic. During his graduate career, Kevan was the recipient of both NSERC’s Post-Graduate Scholarship and Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship, as well as several institutional awards. Kevan brings a wide background and interests in optical physics, biophotonics, optical engineering, software development, simulation, and project management. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Vanilla Bean |
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Hager Gaouda - Biology Technician
Hager graduated with a bachelor’s of science in Cellular and Molecular Biology from the United Arab Emirates University in 2015. She is pursuing her master’s of science at Western with a focus on Chlamydomonadalean plastid genomics. Hager joined PhotoMedicine Labs as the Sr. Biology Technician in 2021 and has previous experience working with lab animals as well as mammalian tissue culture. Hager’s hobbies include videography, anime and hanging out with her cat in her free time. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough |
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Marian Boktor - PhD Student
co-supervised by Dr. Paul Fieguth Marian completed both her undergraduate and master's degree in Electronics and Communication Engineering at the Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport. She joined the PhotoMedicine Labs in January 2020 as a Ph.D student, and is being co-supervised by Dr. Parsin Haji Reza and Prof. Paul Fieguth. Her research interests include biological signal/data processing and analysis, data acquisition methods, image processing, computer vision, and machine learning techniques. Marian is a highly motivated researcher who believes knowledge is power - Loves traveling and helping people to survive. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Stretchy Middle Eastern Ice-Cream or Blueberry Fro-Yo |
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Benjamin Ecclestone - PhD Student
Past: University of Guelph Awards: Dean's Entrance Award, Engineering Excellence Fellowship, NSERC - Alexander Graham Bell Canada Graduate Scholarship, President's Graduate Scholarship. Ben completed his undergraduate degree in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Guelph. Following this, he joined the PhotoMedicine Labs in May 2020 as a M.A.Sc student, but has since moved on to his Ph.D student under Prof. Parsin Haji Reza. His research interests include optical systems, data processing methods, image reconstruction techniques and the development of histological imaging techniques. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Vanilla Bean from Haagen-Dazs |
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Tara Amiri - PhD Student
Past: University of Western Ontario Tara received her B.Sc. degree from the Mechanical Engineering department at Sharif University of Technology in Iran. She continued her studies in an M.Sc. program in the department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Western Ontario. She joined PhotoMedicine Labs as a Research Assistant in May 2021, aiming to continue her collaboration as a Ph.D. student starting from Fall 2021. She enjoys playing badminton and practicing yoga in her free time. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Very Berry Ice Cream |
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Nicholas Pellegrino - Masters Student
Past: University of Waterloo Awards: Engineering Dean's Entrance Award co-supervised by Dr. Paul Fieguth Nicholas graduated from Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo and joined the PhotoMedicine labs in May 2019 as a masters student. Co-supervised by Dr. Haji Reza and Prof. Fieguth, his main focus is on multi-spectral unmixing, working towards chromophore-selective PARS® imaging with applications in PARS® histology. Email: nicholas.pellegrino@uwaterloo.ca Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Chocolate |
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Layla Khalili - Masters Student
Past: Mayo Clinic Awards: MITACS accelerate fellowship Layla graduated from the University of Wisconsin - La Crosse with a B.Sc. in Biomedical Physics and minor in Biology. After graduating, she worked for about a year at the Mayo Clinic in the Neurology department. Currently, she is pursuing her M.A.Sc. in Systems Design Engineering, and is working on an Ophthalmology project and IGF (Image Guided Fibre) project. She has always had a passion in Neurology/Neuroscience with the hopes of steering towards functional PARS® imaging of the brain in the future. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Ben and Jerry's Non-Dairy Chunky Monkey or Mint |
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Lyazzat Mukhangaliyeva - Masters Student
Past: University of Waterloo co-supervised by Dr. Eihab Abdel-Rahman Lyazzat graduated from the University of Waterloo with bachelor’s degree in Nanotechnology Engineering in 2015. She then joined PhotoMedicine Lab's as a volunteer in January 2020. Lyazzat will be starting her MASc in Systems Design Engineering Department in Fall 2020 co-supervised by Dr. Parsin Haji Reza and Prof. Eihab Abdel-Rahman. Her main research interest is in manipulating the optical wavefront using adaptive optics in order to correct for system misalignment, aberrations and other factors reducing the performance of PARS®. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Swiss Chocolate with Walnuts & Strawberries from Marble Slab |
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Alkris Warren - Masters Student
Past: Wilfred Laurier University Kris received is B.SC. in Photonics from WLU. After undergrad he worked in industry, first at Christie Digital assembling and testing optical components for use in projection display systems, then moved onto 2G Robotics, where he worked as a calibration and testing specialist. He was heavily involved in the development of systems that utilized opto-electronics principles, computer vision and date processing and analysis. His research interests primarily revolve around the field of optical product design and development. More specifically, he has a strong inclination towards the design, modelling and analysis of optical systems. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Ben and Jerry's Half Baked Cookie Dough |
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Alex Tummon Simmons - Masters Student
Awards: NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award. Past: University of Waterloo Alex was a Biomedical Engineering student at the University of Waterloo (Class of 2021) and completed an 8-month co-op term with the PhotoMedicine Labs. He joined the PhotoMedicine Labs in spring 2021 as a MASc student under Dr. Parsin Haji Reza. He has significant prior research experience in other fields including focused ultrasound and materials testing. His current research focus is around the design and implementation of novel functional imaging devices. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Gooey Mooey from Cows PEI |
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James Tweel - Masters Student
Awards: Engineering Excellence Fellowship Past: University of Waterloo James was a Biomedical Engineering student at the University of Waterloo (Class of 2021). He joined the PhotoMedicine Labs in fall 2021 as a MASc student under Dr. Parsin Haji Reza. James has industry experience in software development and research experience in signal processing for remote monitoring of vital signs. His research interests include biomedical signal and image processing, medical imaging, and optical systems. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Häagen-Dazs Belgian Chocolate |
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Auguste Koh - Masters Student
Awards: Dean's Entrance Award Past: University of Waterloo co-supervised by Dr. Paul Fieguth Auguste was an undergraduate student in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Waterloo (Class of 2021). He first joined the PhotoMedicine Labs in September 2019 through an Undergraduate Research Assistantship. He joined the PhotoMedicine Labs in fall 2021 as a MASc student. His work focuses on signal processing to improve images produced with PARS®. His research interests include biological signal processing, machine learning, and medical imaging. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Pistachio |
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Nima Abbasi - Research Assistant
Past: University of Waterloo Nima received his BSc degree in Electrical Engineering from Sharif University of Technology in August 2017 and his MASc degree from University of Waterloo in December 2019. His graduate research involved working with real-life fiber-optics data to find solutions for the mitigation of nonlinear impairments in optical links. He has experience working on Machine Learning/Deep Learning projects and also has an appetite for mathematics. Nima joined PhotoMedicine Labs in August 2020 as a research assistant aiming to contribute to the Data Acquisition/Image Processing aspects of the projects. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: French Vanilla |
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Katie Chen - URA
Katie is a third-year undergraduate biomedical engineering student with a specialization in neural engineering. She has completed past coops in software, machine learning, and computational genetics with a focus in neurodevelopmental disorders. Katie is interested in exploring the various research fields in computational biology with a focus on neural applications. This term, she hopes to learn more about the PARS technology and contribute towards its neural imaging applications. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Pistachio Rosewater Gelato |
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Kevin (Kaiwen) Xue - Volunteer URA
Kevin is a third year undergraduate student in Biomedical Engineering. He will be joining the PhotoMedicine Labs as a volunteer undergraduate research assistant for the Fall 2021 Term. His interests are applied computer vision and machine learning. Favourite Ice Cream Flavour: Mango |
Past Members:
Postdocs:
Shahid Haider Postdoctoral fellow (Sept 2019-Sept 2020) Current position: Programmer, Computer Vision Developer, Microscopy at Molecular Oncology UBC/BC Cancer Agency Graduate Students: Zohreh Hosseinaee Ph.D. Student ( graduated Sept 2021). Current position: Post Doc at University of California, Berkeley Benjamin Ecclestone M.A.Sc Student (May 2020-Dec 2020), Moved to PhD. Co-op Student (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) Saad Rasheed Abbasi M.A.Sc Student (Graduated Sept 2020) Current position: PhD student in Systems Design Engineering at UW Jasmine Chan M.A.Sc Student (Graduated Sept 2020) Co-op Students: Krystal Li Co-op Student (May 2021-Aug 2021) Sarah Sparkes Co-op Student (May 2021-Aug 2021) Taylor Pearce Co-op Student (May 2021-Aug 2021) Alex Tummon Simmons Co-op Student (Jan 2020-Aug 2020) NSERC Undergraduate Research Scholarship Martin Le Research Assistant, Co-op Student (Sept 2018- Jan 2020) URI award Chandu Subramaniam Co-op Student (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) Undergraduate Research Assistant (May 2019-Sept 2019) Serene Abu-Sardanah Co-op Student (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) Undergraduate Research Assistant (May 2019-Sept 2019) President's Research Award Aysegul Alpay Co-op Student (Sept 2018-Jan 2019) URI award Bazil Lorenzo Sonier Co-op Student (Sept 2018-May 2019) Undergraduate Research Assistants Amir Roshankar Undergraduate Research Assistant (May 2021-Aug 2021) President's Research Award Inaara Amed-Fazal Undergraduate Research Assistant (May 2021-Aug 2021) President's Research Award Matthew Lee Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2021-Apr 2021) President's Research Award Avery Ryoo Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2021-Apr 2021) Auguste Koh Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2021-Apr 2021) Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) Aarzoo Chennan Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2021-April 2021) Faraz Ali Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2021-April 2021) President's Research Award Anne Mei Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2020-Jan 2021) Furqan Syed Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2020-Jan 2021) President's Research Award YanYan Tran Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2020-Jan 2021) |
Muhammad Mohsin
Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2020-Jan 2021) Amanda Hope Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2020-Apr 2020) President's Research Award Maggie Zhang Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2020-Apr 2020) President's Research Award Sheen Thusoo Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2020-Apr 2020) Karam Danial Undergraduate Research Assistant (Jan 2020-Apr 2020) President's Research Award James Tweel Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) Daniel Javaheri-Zadeh Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) President's Research Award Moujan Saderi Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) Natasha Willis Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) President's Research Award John Quinto Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2019-Dec 2019) President's Research Award Cassandra Maxwell Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2018-Jan 2019) Mikaela Macmanhon Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2018-Jan 2019) Yun Kim Undergraduate Research Assistant (Sept 2018-Jan 2019) President's Research Award Visiting Scholars: Amir Mohammad Farzaneh Visiting Scholar (May 2019-Aug 2019) Ranked second in Iran National Exam ( more than 500,000 participants) |