Penumbra
President, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Penumbra
Adam co-founded Penumbra and has served as Chief Executive Officer and a member of our board of directors since our inception in 2004, as Chairman of our board of directors since January 2015. He resumed the role of President in May 2020, previously serving as President from January 2015 until August 2019. Prior to Penumbra, Adam led SMART Therapeutics, Inc., a medical device company focused on devices for neuro-intervention, as its Chief Executive Officer from 2000 to 2002 and, after its acquisition by Boston Scientific Corporation, President of SMART Therapeutics within Boston Scientific Corporation from 2002 to 2005. Before his work in the medical device industry, Adam was a partner in the law firm of Shartsis Friese LLP. He received a BA from Stanford University and a JD from Hastings College of the Law.
Cleanbox Technology
CEO and Co-Founder
Cleanbox Technology
Amy Hedrick is the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Cleanbox Technology. Her strategy for building a thriving business by solving a real-world problem, and her vision for creating a global impact brand with reach across multiple industries, has grown the company from an idea to a multi-million-dollar global business in two short years. Hedrick brought investment into Cleanbox, and her execution of the company’s vision has established Cleanbox as a brand trusted by its many Fortune 100 and Fortune 500 clients.
Hedrick is a thought leader in the applications of immersive technology as industry disruptors and brings innovation ideas and product functionality to Cleanbox’s smart tech hygiene product lines. She has led multiple teams from project inception and funding, to planning and execution, proving herself an effective leader in multiple industries over the past decade.
Immediately prior to funding and incorporating Cleanbox in 2018, Hedrick served as Manager of Content and Digital Media for the think tank division of Li and Fung, a leading global consumer goods sourcing and manufacturing company based in Hong Kong. Her expertise includes conducting bespoke research and C-level reports within technology, retail, and cross-genre applications. Hedrick was one of four writers for the Fung Business Intelligence Center (FBIC). It was this immersion that inspired the business idea that would eventually lead to Cleanbox.
Hedrick spent her early career working with international aid organizations, managing multiple teams of 50-150 healthcare, construction, and emergency intervention professionals, and overseeing direct-aid projects in addition to fundraising in both the profit and non-profit sectors. In addition, she worked in the film industry raising funds, managing budgets for content creation and production.
Hedrick currently serves on various VR and AR Association committees including; Women’s, Healthcare, Enterprise, Safety & Security as well as the Advisory Board for the International Virtual Reality Healthcare Association, and recently contributed to a book “VR and Healthcare”, a compilation of thought leaders in XR, published by Robert Fine.
Hedrick has been named Analytics Insight Magazine’s “The 10 Most Impactful Women in Technology 2020.”
United Healthcare Group
Sr. Principal Research Scientist
United Healthcare Group
Passionate about research because it can make the world a better place by discovering what's possible.
With a background in academic research and program development, I’m currently utilizing my skills to work with a team of researchers to design novel digital diagnostics & digital adjustments of therapies by incorporating biological and digital signals.
We are developing knowledge & translating into practice driving better healthcare outcomes with technology.
I am intrinsically motivated and inspired by challenging opportunities which require me to fully utilize my existing skill sets and to develop new skills and expertise. I meet each of these opportunities by using the same pragmatic goal-setting approach that I have used in my 30+ years as a competitive athlete.
National Institutes of Health
Associate Investigator
Head of the Communication Attitudes and Behavior Unit
Immersive Virtual Environment Testing Area (IVETA) National Human Genome Research Institute
National Institutes of Health (NIH)
Susan Persky is an Associate Investigator, Head of the Communication Attitudes and Behavior Unit, and directs the Immersive Virtual Environment Testing Area (IVETA) within the Social and Behavioral Research Branch at the National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health (NIH). Dr. Persky earned a B.A. in psychology from Northwestern University, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in social psychology from the University of California, Santa Barbara where she studied at the Research Center for Virtual Environments and Behavior. After conducting postdoctoral research at Columbia University, she came to the NIH in 2005. Dr. Persky splits her effort between providing leadership for the IVETA and conducting her programmatic research. Her work investigates the function of new genomic knowledge about common conditions like obesity in interactions between health care providers and patients, and in public and online discourse. She draws upon virtual reality and other technologically-oriented tools to conduct her research.
University of Colorado
Clinical Psychologist
Deputy Director
National Mental Health Innovation Center
University of Colorado
Anschutz Medical Campus
Debbie Boeldt, PhD, is a licensed clinician with a deep background in research, which has fueled her passion for strength-based approaches to reducing family stress and enhancing well-being. She earned her doctorate in clinical psychology from the University of Colorado Boulder in 2013 and completed her internship in child and couples therapy through the University of California San Diego/Veterans Administration program. After completing a two-year postdoctoral fellowship at the Scripps Translational Science Institute in genomics and digital medicine, she joined a start-up focused on personalized medicine. In 2016, Debbie moved back to Colorado and joined the Clinical Research for Evidence-Based Services and Training lab at the University of Colorado Boulder to focus on web-based interventions for depression and mindfulness. It was in that work that Debbie first collaborated with our Center, and in December 2017 she joined the NMHIC staff as a program manager.
HTC
Manager
VIVE Medical VR
HTC
Healthcare VR Innovation ✖ Clinical Experience ✖ Global Business Development
HTC is a leading innovator in virtual reality and health care, and creates VIVE Reality with fantastic immersive and interactive experience.
Lewis is from VIVE Medical VR Team, and the goal is to shape the future of precision medicine through AI, and VR, and create values of healthcare innovations.
VIVE Reality can help advance healthcare from medical education to clinical applications with solid business impact. VIVE Medical VR team partners global VR developers with the end-to-end pipeline from technology innovation, market access, monetization and penetration to grow healthcare VR ecosystem together.
Simon Fraser University
Distinguished Professor
Simon Fraser University
Founding Director
Pain Studies Lab
Chronic Pain Research Institute
Dr. Diane Gromala, PhD, is a Distinguished Professor at Simon Fraser University, where she is the Founding Director of the Pain Studies Lab and the Chronic Pain Research Institute. Her pioneering VR work builds on her expertise in computer science and patient-centered interaction design, and focuses on clinic-to-home health technologies for managing chronic pain and chronic conditions. Since the 1990s, her innovative VR systems have been clinically tested in hospitals and clinics across the U.S. and Canada.
Dr. Gromala authored over 100 peer-reviewed papers and an MITPress book Windows and Mirrors with Jay Bolter. Her award-winning work began at Apple Computer in the 1980s and top VR labs in the 1990s. It is supported by the NIH/CHIR, the NSF/NSERC, SSHRC; the Paul G. Allen and MacArthur Foundations, and Canada-wide networks of excellence. The technical innovation of Dr. Gromala’s work has recognized by the ACM, IEEE, SIGGRAPH, AIGA, Fulbright, Canada Research Chairs and Google; and featured in numerous media outlets such as the BBC, CBC, CNN, the New York Times, the Discovery Channel, TEDx and Cannes' Health Lions, to name a few.
Dr. Gromala’s multidisciplinary expertise led to new graduate and undergraduate degree programs at Georgia Tech, the University of Washington, the University of Texas, and she reviews such programs worldwide. Dr. Gromala's degrees are from Yale University, the University of Michigan and the University of Plymouth in England.
Stanford University
Founding Director
Stanford University’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab
Jeremy Bailenson is founding director of Stanford University’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab, Thomas More Storke Professor in the Department of Communication, Professor (by courtesy) of Education, Professor (by courtesy) Program in Symbolic Systems, a Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment, and a Faculty Leader at Stanford’s Center for Longevity. He earned a B.A. cum laude from the University of Michigan in 1994 and a Ph.D. in cognitive psychology from Northwestern University in 1999. He spent four years at the University of California, Santa Barbara as a Post-Doctoral Fellow and then an Assistant Research Professor.
Bailenson studies the psychology of Virtual and Augmented Reality, in particular how virtual experiences lead to changes in perceptions of self and others. His lab builds and studies systems that allow people to meet in virtual space, and explores the changes in the nature of social interaction. His most recent research focuses on how virtual experiences can transform education, environmental conservation, empathy, and health. He is the recipient of the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching at Stanford. In 2020, IEEE recognized his work with “The Virtual/Augmented Reality Technical Achievement Award”.
He has published more than 100 academic papers, in interdisciplinary journals such as Science, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and PLoS One, as well domain-specific journals in the fields of communication, computer science, education, environmental science, law, marketing, medicine, political science, and psychology. His work has been continuously funded by the National Science Foundation for 15 years.
Bailenson consults pro bono on Virtual Reality policy for government agencies including the State Department, the US Senate, Congress, the California Supreme Court, the Federal Communication Committee, the U.S. Army, Navy, and Air Force, the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy, the National Research Council, and the National Institutes of Health.
His first book Infinite Reality, co-authored with Jim Blascovich, emerged as an Amazon Best-seller eight years after its initial publication, and was quoted by the U.S. Supreme Court. His new book, Experience on Demand, was reviewed by The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Nature, and The Times of London, and was an Amazon Best-seller.
He has written opinion pieces for Harvard Business Review, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, PBS NewsHour, Wired, National Geographic, Slate, The San Francisco Chronicle, and The Chronicle of Higher Education, and has produced or directed six Virtual Reality documentary experiences which were official selections at the Tribeca Film Festival. His lab’s research has exhibited publicly at museums and aquariums, including a permanent installation at the San Jose Tech Museum.
Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford
Clinical Associate Professor
Pediatric Anesthesia at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford
Co-Director of Chariot Program
Dr. Caruso is a Clinical Associate Professor of Pediatric Anesthesia at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford. He is the co-director of the Chariot Program, which aims to reduce pediatric patients’ anxiety and pain by utilizing immersive technologies, including mixed spatial and virtual reality. Dr. Caruso has published and presented internationally on the utilization of virtual reality in the hospital setting. Software developed by the Chariot Program can be found in hundreds of hospitals and their customized VR hardware solutions are widely used by researchers in the field. He is also founder and board chair of Invincikids, a global non-profit that distributes immersive technologies to pediatric patients around the world.
Yale School of Medicine
Research Scientist
Director, play4REAL XR Lab at Yale
Deputy Director, Yale Center for Health & Learning Games/play2PREVENT Lab
Yale School of Medicine
Editor-in-Chief, Games for Health Journal
Kimberly Hieftje, PhD, is a Research Scientist and the Director of the play4REAL XR Lab at the Yale School of Medicine, which focuses on the development and evaluation of theory and evidence-informed videogame interventions using XR technology. For the past 12 years, her research has focused on the development and testing of health behavior change and education videogames and has published frequently on developing, evaluating, and implementing game interventions. She has worked on games that have focused on topics including e-cigarette prevention, tobacco use prevention, risk reduction in adolescents, HIV/STI prevention, HIV/STI testing, empowering Black teen girls on their sexual health, alcohol use prevention and harm reduction in teens, bystander intervention, LGBTQ bullying, and school climate.
Dr. Hieftje is a third-year K12 Scholar in the Yale Scholars in Implementation Science program (YSIS) at the Yale School of Medicine funded by NHLBI, a program designed to train junior faculty in implementation science. Her research focuses on better understanding the factors associated with successful implementation of game interventions in schools.
Dr. Hieftje is also the Editor-in-Chief of the Games for Health Journal, the premier journal in the field of serious games for health.
Children's Hospital of Illinois
Pediatric Cardiologist
Children's Hospital Illinois
University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria
Founder of Enduvo
Matthew Bramlet, MD is a pediatric cardiologist directing the congenital cardiac MRI program at the Children's Hospital of Illinois and the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria. His success in congenital heart disease surgical planning through 3D printing led to the creation of the Advanced Imaging and Modeling (AIM) Lab within Jump Simulation which offers up free segmentation for programs seeking 3D modeling for pre-surgical planning of complex congenital heart disease. The AIM lab invented a virtual reality authoring capability to meet the needs of teams needing to rapidly convey complex 3D problems. He founded Enduvo, Inc. to transition the tool from a research model to a scaled solution. His current research at U of I studies the efficiency and effectiveness of VR educational models as well as 3D segmentation of patient specific pathologies.
XRSI
Founder and CEO
XRSI
Well known as the “Cyber Guardian”, founder & CEO of the XR Safety Initiative (XRSI), Kavya Pearlman is an award-winning cybersecurity professional with a deep interest in immersive and emerging technologies. She recently launched a novel XRSI Privacy & Safety Framework for the XR and Spatial Computing domain. Kavya is constantly exploring new technologies to solve cybersecurity challenges. She has been named one of the Top Cybersecurity influencers for three consecutive years, 2018-2019-2020 by IFSEC Global. Kavya has previously advised Facebook on third party security risks during the 2016 US presidential elections and worked as the head of security for the oldest virtual world, “Second Life” by Linden Lab. Kavya is the co-host of the immersive podcast “Singularity Watch” and one of the Top 50 speakers in the cybersecurity industry. Kavya has founded The CyberXR Coalition that now focuses on diversity and inclusion and the cross section of Cybersecurity and XR, helped launch a trustworthy XR news platform, ReadyHackerOne and establish a Medical XR Advisory Council.
University of Tennessee-Chattanooga
Assistant Professor
Academic Fieldwork Coordinator
University of Tennessee-Chattanooga
Dr. Cindy W. Poole, OTD, OTR/L is currently an Assistant Professor and Academic Fieldwork Coordinator at the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga. She has extensive clinical experience spanning 36 years in multiple practice areas, most notably in hand therapy, private-practice, and school-based pediatrics. She received her bachelor’s degree in occupational therapy from the Medical College of Georgia, master’s degree in education from Central Michigan University, and post-professional occupational therapy doctorate from Eastern Kentucky University. Previous research works have evaluated the use of virtual reality as a potential intervention modality for children with sensory processing disorders/ Autism and explored the correlation between dynamic hand strength and hand function in healthy adults. Published research evaluated the use of collaborative parent coaching as an intervention model to improve handwriting in kindergarten students.
Case Western Reserve University
Professor, Department of Radiology, School of Medicine
Associate Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Case School of Engineering
Member, Cancer Imaging Program, Case Comprehensive Cancer Center
Case Western Reserve University
Vanderbilt University
Emergency Nurse Practitioner
Adult-Gero Acute Care Nurse Practitioner
Family Nurse Practitioner
Vanderbilt University
Dr. Susanna Rudy is an Emergency Nurse Practitioner, holding certifications as an Adult-Gero Acute Care Nurse Practitioner and Family Nurse Practitioner. Additionally, her previous graduate work in Forensic Science and disaster medicine expands her emergency practice roles.
Clinically, she has more than 25 years of nursing experience within emergency departments, critical care settings, hyperbaric medicine, disaster preparedness and forensics. She continues to serve as a Supervisory Nurse for the Disaster Medical Assistance Teams and practices within the Adult Emergency Department at Vanderbilt Medical Center.
Following graduation from Vanderbilt?s ENP program, Susanna completed a Critical Care Fellowship at Emory University where she identified an interest in point of care ultrasound use. Her doctoral work has focused on the development of national, post-graduate emergency care fellowships. She maintains certification by the American Nurses Credentialing Center as both a Family and Acute Care Nurse Practitioner, as well as her Critical Care RN (CCRN) designation.
West Virgina University
Associate Vice President of Clinical Research Operations and Institutional Advancement
Robert C. Byrd Health Sciences Campus
West Virginia University
Dr. Karshenas is the Associate Vice President of Clinical Research Operations and Institutional Advancement at Robert C. Byrd Health Sciences Campus of West Virginia University, the AVP for the HSC’s Global Engagement Programs, the Director of Technology Commercialization and Associate Professor of Pharmaceutical Systems and Compliance at the School of Pharmacy at WVU. Dr. Karshenas came to WVU from Abbott Laboratories where he functioned as the Global Senior Director of Clinical and Patient Support Services and the Privacy Officer.
Dr. Karshenas received his doctorate degree from the University of Southern Mississippi in Laboratory Medicine with emphasis in infectious diseases. He completed his residency in Diagnostic Laboratory Medicine and Post-doctorate fellowship in infectious diseases.
Dr. Karshenas has a diverse clinical and technical expertise in regulated industries such as medical devices and pharmaceuticals with highly specialized leadership skills in clinical and medical research and developments. In his 30 years of industry experience, he has led global organizations labeled as STARS (Start-ups, Turn-around, Realignments, and Sustaining Success). He is a Six-Sigma Black Belt professional with certifications in Lean-Sigma operations.
Studio Bahia
Design Lead
Studio Bahia
Iva Georgieva holds a BA in Philosophy and MA in Virtual Culture from Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”, Bulgaria. She earned her PhD in Multidisciplinary Sciences (Philosophy of Science) in 2017 from the Department of History and Philosophy of Science, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at The University of Tokyo, Japan. Her PhD discusses the treatment of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in Virtual Reality by considering trauma from a philosophical point of view, based on the theory of the narrative constitution of the self as explanations people create for making meaning of their lives. Her dissertation on the possible treatment of trauma in Virtual Reality reveals how re-assessing memory and stories about past events as an author of one's own life story could change unhealthy cognitive structures and help patients articulate and re-create their reality perception for a new outlook and meaning in their life. In her research she looks at the immersion in Virtual Reality as a new medium for self-identification and self-realization. Currently, she is a Postdoctoral Associate at the Institute for Advanced Study, Varna, Bulgaria where she works on cognitive neuroscience, ethics of technology and narrative theory topics, to mention just a few. Her publications include journals such as Computers in Human Behavior, Brain Sciences, Studies in Health Technology and Informatics, Frontiers in ICT among others. She is part of the EU COST action 18230 INDCOR (Interactive Narrative Design for Complexity Representations) and serves as an Ethics Advisor in the Personalised Recovery Through a Multi-User Environment: Virtual Reality for Rehabilitation (PRIME - VR2) project, part of the Horizon 2020 call ‘Interactive Technologies’. She has been part of the Studio Bahia team since 2018 and from early 2020 she is taking the role of Design Lead.
BehaVR
Founder and CEO
BehaVR, LLC
Aaron Gani is the founder and CEO of BehaVR, LLC, creating digital therapeutics for behavioral health through the unmatched psychological power of Virtual Reality. Gani has been creating applications and experiences with technology throughout his career in healthcare and financial services, up to and including serving as Chief Technology Officer of Humana, a Fortune 50 managed care organization.
After a decade+ in healthcare leading technology development of population health, utilization management, disease management programs, pharmacy, primary care, urgent care, Health IT, and clinical analytics, and constantly working on ways to improve and empower consumer health with technology, data and analytics, Gani identified the crucial gap between knowledge, tools, and activation of healthy behavior, and believes Virtual Reality experiences can close that gap.
Gani is a founding member of the Strategic Advisory Board of the Digital Medicine (DiMe) Society, and a founding advisory board member of the International Virtual Reality Healthcare Association (IVRHA). Gani holds a Master’s in Predictive Analytics from Northwestern University, an MBA, General Management and Health Sector Management from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, and a BS in Management/CIS from the University of Louisville.
Pain Studies Lab
Mitacs Elevate Post-Doctoral Fellow
Pain Studies Lab
Simon Fraser University
Zahra is a Mitacs Elevate Post-Doctoral Fellow in Pain Studies Lab at Simon Fraser University in Canada. She acquired her PhD. in Neuroscience from the University of Calgary. She also has a BA and MA degrees in Clinical Psychology from University of Tehran. She is currently working on developing and performing a functional magnetic resonance imaging study to explore the effect of meditative virtual reality environments on the brain in patients with chronic pain conditions.
Kaspect
Chief Scientist
Kaspect
Dr. Cohn is a Computational Biologist and NSF Graduate Fellow who focuses on creative digital applications in healthcare. In 2015 he founded Kaspect, a strategy consultancy focusing on artful application of artificial intelligence to biotechnology problems at companies big and small. His portfolio of work extends across clinical research firms, hospital networks, and biotechnology companies. With underpinnings in computational biology, and with a foundation for data-driven biomedical science, his career has led him through the design and deployment of medical devices and AI-driven digital instruments, culminating in impactful papers in journals such as Frontiers in Computational Biology and Nature Machine Intelligence. He is the Co-Founder of AdventureBiofeedback (a technology company for speech-language pathology) and the Director of Research at ObvioHealth (a clinical research organization).
Penumbra
Executive Vice President
General Manager
Real System
Penumbra
Gita joined Penumbra in 2016 and currently serves as Executive Vice President and General Manager, Real System. Prior to joining Penumbra, Gita worked at Stryker Corporation for 12 years where she held a variety of positions with successively greater responsibility in both Stryker’s Orthopedics Group and Neurovascular division in product management, strategy, business development/integration and information technology. Prior to Stryker, Gita held various product development roles with other cardiovascular medical device companies including WL Gore and Associates and Cordis, a Johnson & Johnson company, in the areas of coronary and peripheral vascular products. Gita received a BS in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Miami (FL) and an Executive MBA from Santa Clara University.
Virtually Healthy
Managing Director
Virtually Healthy
After realising the potential of VR in helping to solve the major problem of low engagement in exercise for health, Katie founded Virtually Healthy to conduct the necessary research to bring VR games into the health and fitness industries, with an aim to improve mental and physical health. Katie has a BSc in Applied Sport and Exercise Science and an MSc in Biomedical Engineering, with a focus on the gamification of exercise using virtual reality.
Stanford University
Conference Co-Chair
Behavioral Neuroscientist
Stanford University
Walter Greenleaf is a neuroscientist and a medical technology developer working at Stanford University. With over three decades of research and development experience, Walter is considered a leading authority in the field of digital medicine and medical virtual reality technology.
Research Focus:
Walter’s current research focus is on developing computer supported clinical products, with a specific emphasis on applying virtual reality and digital health technology to address difficult problems in behavioral and physical medicine such as Post-traumatic Stress, Anxiety Disorders, Depression, Traumatic Brain Injury and Stroke, Addictions, and Autism Spectrum Disorder.
His early research was on age-related changes in the neuroendocrine system and the effects on human behavior.
Academic Positions:
Walter is currently a Distinguished Visiting Scholar at Stanford University’s MediaX Program, a Visiting Scholar at Stanford University’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab, and the Director of Technology Strategy at the University of Colorado National Mental Health Innovation Center. He previously served as the Director of the Mind Division, Stanford Center on Longevity, where his focus was on age-related changes in cognition.
Medical Product Development:
Walter has designed and developed numerous clinical systems over the last thirty-five years, including products in the fields of: surgical simulation, 3D medical visualization, telerehabilitation, clinical informatics, clinical decision support, point-of-care clinical data collection, ergonomic evaluation technology, automatic sleep-staging systems, psychophysiological assessment, and simulation-assisted rehabilitation technologies, as well as digital eHealth products for behavioral medicine.
Academic Leadership:
Walter is the Co-founder and Board Chair for the International Virtual Reality Health Association (IVRHA).
He helped establish the California State University Center for Disability Solutions and the International Society of Virtual Rehabilitation (ISVR). Walter is a scientific advisor and grant reviewer for the U.S. Public Health Service, National Science Foundation (NSF), National Institutes of Health (NIH), Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI), NASA, and the U.S. Department of Education (DoED). He has served as the Principal Investigator for research projects funded by the NIH and by NASA.
Corporate Management:
Walter founded and served as CEO for Greenleaf Medical Systems, a medical product development company; InWorld Solutions, a company specializing in the therapeutic use of virtual worlds for behavioral health care; and Virtually Better, a company that develops virtual environments for the treatment of phobias, anxiety disorders, and PTSD. Walter was the founding Chief Science Officer for Pear Therapeutics.
Academic Journals:
Walter is an Associate Editor for three academic journals: JMIR Mental Health, the Journal of Virtual Reality in Medicine, and Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking.
Current Board Positions:
Walter serves on the Board of Directors for Brainstorm: The Stanford Laboratory for Brain Health Innovation and Entrepreneurship; for Cognitive Leap, a company that develops mental health solutions for children; and for Sine Wave, the developer of Sine Space, a multi-user online Unity 3D-based virtual world platform. He is currently the technology and neuroscience advisor to several early-stage medical product companies.
Walter earned a Doctorate in Neuro and Bio-Behavioral Sciences from the Stanford University School of Medicine, where he was awarded a NIMH Graduate Fellowship.
UT Dallas Center for BrainHealth
Director, Youth & Family Innovations
Director, Charisma Virtual Social Training
University of Texas at Dallas
With a strong foundation in research, business, healthcare and education, Maria is dedicated to working closely with educational and healthcare organizations to research, develop and promote virtual social learning, brain health, and parenting programs from coast to coast. Community-based outreach has been at the forefront of Maria’s professional ambition, and she is excited to explore the next level of innovation, partnership and distribution for the UT Dallas Center For BrainHealth Charisma- Virtual Social Training and Youth & Family Innovation Initiatives. Maria is a strong advocate for bringing education and awareness of social brainhealth and leadership skills to the forefront of education and healthcare, with strategic focus on neurodiversity. She is proud to serve as a key community resource in assisting youth organizations, clinicians, teachers, and families discover how to best support the social, emotional and cognitive development of the youth in their lives. She currently sits on Mental Health & Wellbeing Strategic Planning Committee for the Girl Scouts-North East Texas region, as well as develops leadership programming for the National Charity League, Inc.
Maria is a seasoned Speech Language Pathologist, currently residing in Texas. She graduated from Eastern Michigan University with a Masters of Art in Communication Disorders. Her undergraduate degree was in Special Education, with a concentration in communication sciences. Prior to joining the University of Texas at Dallas, Maria was the founder and CEO of a non-profit organization in Los Angeles, supporting at-risk youth and their families for over 15 years in navigating educational and healthcare systems to best access speech, language, and social learning services.
Studio Bahia
Designer
Studio Bahia
Christina Chrysanthopoulou was born in Athens, Greece in 1986. She holds a M.Sc. in Architecture Engineering, from the National Technical University of Athens, and a M.A. in "Art and Virtual Reality", a collaboration between the Athens School of Fine Arts and the Paris 8 University. Currently, she is a PhD candidate at the School of Film Studies of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, focusing her research on the impact of narrative virtual reality experiences on the fear of death. She has several publications in conferences such as Hybrid City II (Athens, 2013), Digital Storytelling in Times of Crisis (Athens, 2014), IEEE VR2015 (Arles, 2015), and VS-Games Barcelona (2017), concerning the creation of digital content for educational and artistic applications. She has participated with personal and group projects in various exhibitions and festivals, such as Festival Miden (Kalamata, 2014), the "Invisible Cities" festival (Athens, 2016), the exhibition "Dream Minds in Virtual Bodies" at the metamatic Taf gallery (Athens, 2016), the Ars Electronica Festival (Linz, 2015), the A.MAZE festival (Berlin, 2018), the Athens Digital Arts Festival 2020, and the Ars Electronica Garden Athens 2020.
She has worked as an adjunct professor at the Multimedia Lab of the Athens School of Fine Arts and has conducted multiple seminars on virtual reality and game design at institutions and research centers such as the Onassis Cultural Center.
She is a co-founder and art director of ViRA | Virtual Reality Applications, a company based in Greece that designs and develops interactive extended reality content, and a designer for Studio Bahia, a nonprofit providing low-cost therapies in virtual reality.
Health Education England
Senior Ophthalmology Resident
Moorfields Eye Hospital
Topol Digital Health Fellow
Health Education England
Dr. Abison Logeswaran is currently working as a senior ophthalmology resident at Moorfields Eye Hospital, London, U.K. and a Topol Digital Health Fellow working for Health Education England. He has published research on the coal-face application of health informatics and extended reality (XR) technologies. In particular, his work has focussed on providing healthcare professionals with tools and techniques in the application of EPR’s and XR technologies from a range of disciplines including usability science, human-computer interaction, psychology and health informatics. His current research is focussed on the creation of a toolkit for the implementation and evaluation of extended reality technologies in healthcare education and training.
Studio Bahia
Designer
Studio Bahia
Renia Papathanasiou is sound engineer and XR designer, developer, and producer. She completed her studies at the Department of Music Technology and Acoustics of the Hellenic Mediterranean University in Rethymno, Crete and she holds a Master of Arts in "Art, virtual reality and multi-user systems of artistic expression" (a collaboration between the Athens School of Fine Arts and the department of Arts and Technologies of the Image of the Paris 8 University). Since 2013 her research concentrates in extended reality systems and artistic interactive installations as well as in the involvement of extended reality systems in education especially addressed to special-needs populations via ludic environments. Her individual and team works have been presented in several conferences and festivals, including the IEEE VR2015 in Arles, the Digital Storytelling in Times of Crisis in Athens, the International Conference: The Future of Education, 5th Edition (2015) in Florence-Italy, Festival Miden in Kalamata, the 5th International eLife Dual Congress in Greece, the Invisible Cities Conference (University of Athens, Communication and Media Department) in Athens, the exhibition “Dream Minds in Virtual Bodies” at the metamatic Taf gallery in Athens, in Layer One Conference Greece 2018 etc. Since 2016 she works also as a tutor in several educational seminars on design and creation of immersive interactive experiences using XR technologies and
game development, in collaboration with the Onassis Foundation, Panteion University and Space Under and since 2018 she co-organizes the Global Game Jam Athens. She is the co-founder and Managing Director of ViRA | Virtual Reality Applications, a company founded in 2016 based in Greece that focuses on the design and development of XR applications and game development. Since 2019 works in Pausilypon Films and Documatism as a project manager focusing mainly on interactive documentary films and installations. Currently she is a PhD Candidate at the School of Film of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece.
Emteq
Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer
Emteq
Charles Nduka is co-founder and chief scientist. His first foray in VR was in 1994 as part of a project on surgical training. He is a facial surgeon and internationally recognised expert in disorders of facial expression. Charles has been awarded a number of awards and research grants, including from the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), the Wellcome Trust, InnovateUK, and the Nominet Trust. He co-founded Emteq in 2015 to develop the ability to track and transmit facial expressions in VR and AR.
Keck School of Medicine at University of Southern California
Associate Professor
Pediatrics and Medical Education
Keck School of Medicine at University of Southeast California
Dr Todd P Chang, MD MAcM is Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Medical Education in the Keck School of Medicine at University of Southeast California, and works clinically in the Division of Emergency Medicine & Transport at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. Most recently, he and his research / development team is piloting a multi-center / multi-national expansion of VR simulation for low-frequency, high-stakes resuscitation training throughout the US, Austria, and Switzerland. He is a leading expert in physician training and assessment using educational technologies including distance learning, simulation, serious games, and virtual reality, having completed multiple multi-national grant-funded studies and over 50 scientific publications. Dr Chang aims for scientific evidence and proof of concept for all technological innovation in healthcare. He is the academic scholarship side of the current efforts with Dr Josh Sherman to implement VR at CHLA and with the healthcare provider community.
University of Central Florida
Assistant Professor
University of Central Florida
Nurse Practitioner
Jackson Memorial Hospital
Dr. Guido-Sanz’s research, which he has presented regionally and internationally, focuses on healthcare associated infections, patient outcomes and quality indicators, minimizing healthcare costs, and the role of advanced practice nurses (APNs) as intensivists in intensive care units. At UCF, he plans to develop and establish research in the area of Advance Practice Nursing. He is currently resubmitting his dissertation research, which evaluated the effects of APNs as intensivists in a surgical intensive care unit on patient outcomes and healthcare charges, for publication and seeking grants to further develop the field of research.
Virtual Bodyworks
Managing Director
Virtual Bodyworks
Charlie is currently Managing Director at Virtual Bodyworks, a spin-off from the University of Barcelona and Hospital Clinic Barcelona. Charlie joined the founding team having worked for several years in Technology M&A in London, where he raised capital totalling c. €1bn for start-ups and growth businesses through IPOs and capital raises. Since joining Virtual Bodyworks, Charlie implemented the World’s first neurorehabilitation tool based on the advanced VR concept of embodiment into Madrid’s leading neurorehabilitation hospital, Hospital Los Madroños. Virtual Bodyworks aims to become the first take-home, clinically- validated and regulated immersive VR neurorehabilitation solution in the world.
Charlie’s background is in Economics, he has a Master’s degree from Trinity College in Dublin. He also holds an MBA from IESE Business School in Barcelona.
Softcare Studios
CEO
Softcare Studios
Tech entrepreneur focused on digital health and mental well-being, TEDx speaker, and writer. Biologist, Ph.D. in Neuropharmacology, with International academic research experience in pharmacology, organic chemistry, and molecular biology in the fields of oncology and neuronal metabolism. CEO at Softcare Studios, a digital health startup specialized in developing virtual reality solutions for stress management and therapy education in patients undergoing medical treatments. A regular contributor to online magazines on the topics of emerging tech, healthcare, and startup ecosystems. Actively involved in education, communication, and consulting initiatives focused on innovation and social impact.
light clinic
Founder
light clinic
David Lobser is an artist and developer. He teaches animation and creative code at Harvard, NYU, SVA, CU, Parsons etc. His work in virtual reality revolves around the creation of luxurious senscapes that make use of procedural techniques in computer graphics as expressive tools. These projects include multi-user, location-based experiences (Flock), applications designed to produce flow states (Cosmic Sugar), and environments to improve set & setting for therapeutic purposes (Visitations). These projects involve collaborations with musicians, therapists, doctors, and scientists. He was a co-founder of Luxury Escapism, New York's first digital spa. His work has been seen at Coachella, Burning Man, FoST, the Phi Center, Mutek, Electric Daisy Carnival, SXSW, and more.
withVR
Founder
withVR
Gareth Walkom, Founder of withVR, utilizes virtual reality as a tool for speech disorders to better prepare individuals for speaking situations. Since 2015, Gareth has developed various applications, producing VR tools featuring on TV, podcasts, and other media worldwide. His past research has shown how eye-tracking in VR can be used as an objective tool for speech-language pathologists and researchers to quantify the eye behaviors of people with speech disorders. Gareth's motivation behind withVR is not only his past research but also the fact that he stutters himself.
Cleveland Clinic
Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeon
Cleveland Clinic
Joseph Krajekian, DMD. MD. FAAOMS, DABOMS. is board certified Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeon. Dr. Krajekian completed his bachelor’s degree in molecular and cellular biology at California State University Fresno. He later attended dental school at Tufts University School of Dental Medicine. Following his DMD degree, he obtained his medical doctor degree, MD., at Drexel College of Medicine and completed his 6 year surgical training at Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania.
He was a staff at the prestigious Cleveland Clinic for over 8 years and an associate clinical facility at Case Western School of Dental Medicine for over 5 years. Currently he is on staff Southpoint Hospital of the Cleveland Clinic and visiting professor at Tufts University School of Dental Medicine in Boston, MA.
Dr. Krajekian is very well versed in all aspect of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery with great emphasis in utilizing the most advance surgical techniques and technologies. He is forefront in utilizing virtual surgical planning in his reconstructive surgeries , orthognathic surgery and dental implants. Additionally, he has been creatively utilizing advances in adult stem cell research in his surgical reconstructions procedures in addition to platelet rich plasma.
Dr. Krajekian is one of surgeon across the world utilizing virtual reality (VR) in his major reconstructive surgeries. He also serves as a medical advisor for creating protocols and educator for Immersive Touch VR company out of Chicago.
Most recently he is working with 3D custom titanium printing and early phase of 3D bone printing technology.
Dr. Krajekian has special interests in
Integration of Virtual Reality in Surgery
Maxillofacial reconstructive surgery,
Surgical and non surgical management of temporomandibular disorders,
Surgical and non surgical management of obstructive sleep apnea,
Reconstructive of Jaw Deformity (orthognathic) surgery,
Maxillofacial trauma,
Dental implants,
Bone grafting procedures
Wisdom teeth.
Dr. Krajekian is actively involved in teaching and lecturing locally, nationally and internationally. Additionally, he was part of the curriculum committee of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery and Dentistry at the Cleveland Clinic.
Additionally, while at the Cleveland Clinic he was co-founder of a one of a kind multidisciplinary team in the management of Temporomandibular Joint Disorder. He has also founder for one of a kind virtual simulation course for management of medical emergencies at the dental office.
He has numerous publications in various aspect of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery. He was also a contributor to the Cleveland Clinic head and neck institute publication and currently serves as editor for the International Oxford Journal Surgical case reports, International Advances in Dentisty and Oral heath, and Wiki How medical board advisory. He also serves as an expert at the ohio state dental board.
Studio Bahia
Design Lead
Founder
Studio Bahia
Allen is Design Lead and Founder of Studio Bahia. The story of Studio Bahia began 3 years
ago with finding a way to provide therapy to children in crises at refugee camps. Our search
for a way to reach the children had us innovate and create a new model for providing
psychological therapies to vulnerable populations.
Studio Bahia's therapies include chronic pain, Alzheimer’s disease, pain management,
natural and man made disaster, refugee, temporal recalibration for autism, schizophrenia,
Parkinson’s disease, strabismus and amblyopia, narrative exposure therapy, solution
focused therapy, and others. We provide companies with therapies for their employees,
patients, and clients at a large scale and at the most competitive price in the wellness
industry, our virtual reality headsets sell for $25 and for each purchase we donate a
headset to vulnerable populations from nurses unions to refugees to disaster hit regions.
Allen has lived in 10 countries and backpacked +80 countries, in the evenings he is
completing a PhD in Philosophy, Aesthetics, and Art Theory with a dissertation in
Immersion Theory.
Paracosma
Founder and CEO
Paracosma
Ken Ehrhart is the Founder and CEO of Paracosma, an Augmented and Virtual Reality Solutions Provider offering AR & VR application development, 3D modeling and content creation, 360 video production and distribution. Paracosma is a Founding Member of the IVRHA and has created VR Surgery Training and Senior Social and Brain-Health VR Games. Mr. Ehrhart is also a Cofounder and General Partner at SunBridge Partners, a Venture Capital firm that helps US Enterprise SAAS Companies enter the Japanese market.
UT Dallas Center for BrainHealth
Aaron Tate
Head of Emerging Tech
Center for BrainHealth
Technology Lead on the BrainHealth Project
University of Texas at Dallas
Aaron Tate is the Head of Emerging Tech at Center for BrainHealth and Technology Lead on the BrainHealth Project. His game Digital Emotes was an honorable mention at the 2020 Games for Change – VR Alcove competition. Aaron was a member of the 2019 Oculus Launchpad Cohort, Co-founded VR for Good-DFW and was awarded a MegaGrant from Epic Games for Charisma VR, a social training platform which was also a finalist in the 2017 International Educational Games Competition in Graz, Austria. His current research involves immersion, biofeedback, data visualization and human-computer interface.
Health Education England
Leading Technologies Advisor
National Health Service
United Kingdom
Richard passionately believes that education has the power to transform lives. In his role as learning technologies advisor to the NHS he gets to do just that, by researching and developing new technologies to support every step of a healthcare learners’ education. Throughout his career, Richard has supported the delivery of education and training with health and care organisations across the UK; international development work with governments in Mexico, Malaysia and South East Asia; and building learning and acting as an ambassador with LearnAppeal in Kenya.
University of Pennsylvania
Medical Student
Perelman School of Medicine
University of Pennsylvania
Jonathan Wakim is a medical student at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He graduated from the University of Florida with a degree in Economics. Previously, he worked in the Center for Safety, Simulation, and Advanced Learning Technologies developing mixed reality simulators for training physicians. He currently conducts research in Augmented Reality and Digital Health at both the Penn Image-Guided Interventions Lab and the Penn Center for Cancer Innovation.
OVR Technology
Co-Founder and CEO
OVR Technology
A mad scientist, artist, and olfactory evangelist.
Aaron has been called the ‘Indiana Jones of Scent,
due to his lifelong obsession with the power of
scent and how it can benefit the human experience.
This has led him around the world collecting and
bottling scent memories. Prior to founding OVR
Technology, Aaron spent years crafting experiences
around taste, flavor, and aroma, working as a
professional chef, a mixologist, a sommelier, and
sensory artist. OVR Technology is the second olfaction-based company he has co-founded on his over 20-year journey combining the art and science of our oldest most primal sense and technology to produce meaningful, measurable human outcomes.
BakerHughes
Innovation Engineer
BakerHughes
Samvid Jhaveri is an Innovation Engineer at BakerHughes. His primary focus technologies are AR/VR, Computer Vision and Wearable technologies. He has been working in AR/VR for around 5 years now.
He is always thrilled at the interaction of AR/VR with new technologies and industries. His exploration led him to various VR/AR project overlapping fields sucks as AI, 3D Data Visualization, Social Sciences, Narrative Media, Oil & Gas, Healthcare etc.
He is currently working in utilizing Augmented Reality, 3D cameras, Computer Vision & deep learning for markerless tracking in the healthcare field. Our methodology will be able track multiple equipment in operating room without using any markers.
He finished his master’s in Computational media at University of California, Santa Cruz. His research was focused in How Social Interaction changes between people in VR, Wearable technologies in Live Action Role Play games and Human-Food Interaction.
EducationXR
President and CEO
Heizenrader LLC
Cory Heizenrader, President and CEO of Heizenrader LLC, has consulted and collaborated for over ten years with leading medical institutions and device manufacturers including Mayo Clinic, Cleveland Clinic, Medtronic, Becton Dickenson, GE, Philips and others, to produce innovative and immersive medical education product solutions to accelerate understanding of anatomy and medical technology. His mission is to use innovation to globalize medical education, thus empowering care givers with knowledge necessary to make critical decisions and provide exceptional patient care. He holds a Bachelor’s of Science in Physiology and Developmental Biology from Brigham Young University and considers his greatest success to be his wife and two children.
Ohio University
Professor
J. Warren McClure School of Emerging Communication Technologies
Ohio University
Eric R. Williams is a professor in the J. Warren McClure School of Emerging Communication Technologies at Ohio University, where he is also the director of the MFA in Communication Media Arts program. As co-creator of the Immersive Media Initiative, Eric has overseen dozens of VR cinema projects for the Game Research and Immersive Design (GRID) Lab. These projects are highlighted in a forthcoming book by Focal Press: Virtual Reality Cinema: Non-Fiction Projects and Procedures. Eric is also co-authoring a companion book titled VR Cinema: Narrative Tips and Techniques. Eric is one of the chief architects of the GRID Lab’s Virtual Reality curriculum. The curriculum was designed to bolster VR research at Ohio University – combining classroom learning with hands-on production experience on faculty-led projects.
Biominds
CEO
BioMinds
Expert with 20 years' experience international level in the IT industry. Creator of the most important Polish start-ups such as MedApp. Mentor, advisor, president in start-ups. It has been included in the list of "50 most influential people in the Polish start-up industry", which was developed by editors naTemat and InnPoland.
University of Florida
Executive Director
EACN Research Program
University of Florida
Ajay Mittal is the Executive Director of the EACN Research Program at the University of Florida. He leads an organization of over 100 students and medical professionals on research encompassing all realms of digital health, ranging from mobileECGs to digital ophthalmoscopes and virtual medicine. He is currently leading a group of 25 research assistants recruiting oncology patients for the first distraction-based virtual reality at UF Health with plans to expand to several different patient populations in the coming months. He is a graduate from the University of Florida with a degree in Biological Sciences and will be matriculating into medical school in 2021.
Yale School of Medicine
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics
Yale School of Medicine
Director of Pediatric Neuro-Oncology
Director of the Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) Cancer Program
Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital
Asher M. Marks, MD, is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the Yale School of Medicine and practicing pediatric hematologist/oncologist. He is the Director of Pediatric Neuro-Oncology and also serves as the Director of the Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) cancer program for Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital.
While his clinical research frequently focuses on the care and treatment of children with brain tumors, his role as the director of the AYA program has led to the development of a virtual reality-based support group for adolescents and young adults with cancer. In collaboration with Foretell Reality, a clinical trial was launched in the fall of 2019, with very exciting early findings.
In addition, Dr. Marks serves on the Board of Directors for Child’s Play, a game industry charity dedicated to improving the lives of children in hospitals and domestic violence shelters, through the power of play.
Vanderbilt University
Professor Department of School of Nursing
Professor Department of Biomedical Informatics
Vanderbilt University
Motlow State Community College
President
Motlow State Community College
Dr. Michael Torrence is the president of Motlow State Community College. The college has campuses in Smyrna, Sparta, Tullahoma, McMinnville and Fayetteville, Tennessee. He has spent his career embracing the use of technological literacy as a platform to increase student access, engagement and success. He has served as the Co-Chairperson for TNeCampus, a Tennessee Board of Regents statewide team leader for the integration of Emerging Technology and Mobilization in the areas of Gaming, VR, AR, and MR into teaching and learning. He has trained faculty, students, executives, and community members and developed immersive curriculum focused on STEAMB (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art/Aviation, Mathematics, and Business focused on Entrepreneurship) for all grade levels and utilized these platforms teaching undergraduate and graduate students in his own classes where VR and entrepreneurship is a norm. Currently, he is researching and developing a platform for OER through support of Hewlett-Packard and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in addition to meeting workforce needs through traditional and emerging needs, such as, AI, and Voice Technology, Mechatronics, Allied Health, Vision System, and the Automation Robotics Training Center. He earned a doctor of philosophy degree, with a major in exceptional learning, at Tennessee Tech University, and master of arts and bachelor of arts degrees at South Dakota State University, both with a major in English. Michael is a veteran of the U.S. Air Force, serving as a senior airman from 1992 to 1996.
University of Michigan
Director, XR Initiative
University of Michigan
Why I choose to work at Academic Innovation:
Leading the next generation of transformative technologies is rooted in solving pain points for different audiences, and that is what I have cultivated in my previous work experiences. I have a track record of creating initiatives from the ground up to become successful, impactful, and sustainable organizations that utilize technology to change the world. I am confident that my experience and leadership will drive the University of Michigan to the next level in creating a leading center of XR for faculty, industry, students, and the community to change the world.
Current Roles/Previous Experience:
As the Director of the XR Initiative, Jeremy will lead an effort to seed new projects and experiments that integrate XR into residential and online curricula, and to create innovative public/private partnerships to develop new XR related educational technology. Prior to joining AI, Jeremy was the co-founder and managing partner for Afia Inc, an Ann Arbor based healthcare consulting firm that worked with organizations across the country to assist in selecting and implementing technology solutions to improve processes and patient experiences.
Ask me to learn about:
Emerging technologies including home automation and electric vehicles as well as digital video production in athletics.
New York University College of Dentistry
Director of Educational Technology
NYU College of Dentistry
Cristián Opazo is the Director of Educational Technology at the NYU College of Dentistry. He is in charge of establishing and implementing the long-term strategy for technology-enhanced education at the College of Dentistry. He is a designer, developer and manager of curricular initiatives involving the purposeful use of learning technologies into healthcare education. His areas of expertise are curricular development, instructional design, project management in higher education, and development of VR/AR learning environments. His research has been published in the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, Public Library of Science, and Complex Systems. He has a Ph.D. (ABD) and a Master's degree in physics from Michigan State University and a B.Sc. degree in physics from Universidad de Chile.
University of Chester
Senior Research Professor
Department of Computer Science
University of Chester
Professor Nigel W. John has been a Senior Research Professor within the Department of Computer Science of the University of Chester since July 2015. Previously, he was based at Bangor University and the University of Manchester, and was a director of the pan-Wales Research Institute of Visual Computing (RIVIC). In 2006 he was awarded the 12th annual Satava Award to acknowledge his accomplishments in the field of computer graphics and medical visualization. In 2009 he was elected as a Fellow of the Eurographics Association and in 2014 as a Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales.
NYU College of Dentistry
Uttam Grandhi is an award-winning Mixed Reality Developer and an Origami Artist. He is an alumnus of NYU-ITP and is the lead developer for NYU College of Dentistry’s Local Anesthesia VR training program, a first of its kind in the US. In 2020 he collaborated with Rubin Museum of Art in New York City to create The Lotus Effect project, an initiative with major recognition from press and media. At the start of COVID-19 pandemic, in collaboration with researchers from MIT, he started the openPPE project, creating an origami-based, low-cost, N95+ filtration-efficient face mask which can easily be replicated anywhere in the world without the need for advanced machinery. In 2018, he co-founded PlayGAMI, an Augmented Reality Origami Creativity platform, which has been featured at Maker Faire NYC, Maker Faire Bay Area, SIGGRAPH, Chuck Jones Center for Creativity, Rubin Museum of Art, National Museum of Mathematics, and Computer History Museum. He has also won recognitions from MIT, Harvard University, and NASA for initiatives in Augmented Reality and Origami.
Ohio University
Director
Game Research and Immersive Design (GRID) Lab
Ohio University
John Bowditch is the director of the Game Research and Immersive Design (GRID) Lab at Ohio University. The GRID Lab was founded in 2004 with a grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission to bring immersive technology education, research, and entrepreneurial support to southeast Ohio. Nearly a dozen companies have spun out of the GRID Lab since its founding. http://gridlab.ohio.edu
John is an associate professor of game development and virtual reality in the J. Warren McClure School of Emerging Communication Technologies in the Scripps College of Communication. He was named Ohio University’s Outstanding Administrator of the year in 2019. http://ohio.edu/mcclure
John has led over 20 funded research and development projects at Ohio University exceeding over $7 million in support. Sponsors have included the National Institutes of Health, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Energy, Department of Labor, Department of Education, and the Ohio Colleges of Medicine Government Resource Center. He was the lead designer and inventor of the Immersive Video Intel Network (IVIN), a multi-tiered imaging technology that has patents pending.
University of Michigan
Professor
University of Michigan
Specialties: Surgery
Area of Practice: Endocrine surgery including thyroid surgery for benign and malignant disease, minimally invasive thyroid and parathyroid surgery, laparoscopic and open adrenalectomy for adrenal tumors and disorders, multiple endocrine neoplasia and medullary thyroid cancers, and surgery for advanced melanomas.
Stanford University
Co-Director
Stanford Wu Tsai Visualization Core
Research Scientist and Instructor for Mixed Reality in Medicine
Stanford University
IVRHA
Executive Director and Founder
IVRHA
Robert is the Executive Director and Founder of IVRHA (International Virtual Reality and Healthcare Association).
In 2009, Robert started Cool Blue Media by organizing the first social media conference on the east coast of the United States, leading to the publication of the text book, "The Big Book of Social Media Case Studies, Stories and Perspectives" and shortly thereafter the only printed magazine covering social media, The Social Media Monthly. In May 2016, he launched VRVoice.co, a content vertical exploring virtual reality in the enterprise. In 2017, Robert started the largest annual conference on virtual reality and healthcare with events taking place both in the US and Europe.
Prior to 2009, Robert was the Senior Director of Global Strategy and Development of IT at Conservation International (CI). Robert joined CI in 2000 to take responsibility for connecting all of CI’s forty field offices to the Internet with broadband connectivity. During his 10 year tenure, he built an international staff of 25 IT professionals.
Robert has over ten years of additional work experience as a systems and sales engineer with various companies including CMGI, Hughes Network Systems, ioWave and Raytheon. Robert has a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Villanova University, a master’s degree in environmental science and public policy from Johns Hopkins University, and is ABD at George Mason University.
All Times Are EST
Robert Fine
Dr. Walter Greenleaf*
Dr. Jeremy Bailenson*
Adam Elsesser*
Cory Heizenrader
Dr. Matthew Bramlet
Ken Ehrhart
Mateusz Kierepka
Richard Price
Kavya Pearlman
Charlie Pearmund
Gita Barry
Nigel W. John
Dr. Cindy W. Poole
Dr. Valentino Megale
Katie Hoolahan
Dr. Brian Cohn
Gareth Walkom
1) ArborXR
2) Primal Pictures
3) Playing Forward
4) Tipping Point Media
5) Healium
6) BrickSimple
David Lobser
Ajay Mittal
Co-presented with Jonathan Wakim
Dr. Zahra Ofoghi
Cristián Opazo
Co-presenting with Uttam Grandhi
XR Bootcamp
Dr. Brendon Hale*
Aaron Gani
Dr. Joseph Krajekian
Allen Olson-Urtecho
Co-Presenting with Dr. Iva Georgina, Renia Papathanasiou and Chrisitina Chrysanthopoulous
Dr. Abison Logeswaran
Dr. Charles Nduka
Samvid Jhaveri
1) Immersive Worlds
2) Elara Systems
3) Touch of Life Technologies
4) Healthy Simulation
5) GIGXR
Aaron Wisniewski
Amy Hedrick
Lewis Chang
Receive an overview from leading universities across the country and overseas that are leading the way in integrating virtual and augmented reality into their curriculum and programs.
This track will be chaired by Dr. Jonathan Sherman.
Dr. Susan Persky*
Dr. Frank Guido-Sanz
Dr. Debra Boeldt
Dr. Allie Karshenas
Dr. Mark Griswold
Dr. Michael Torrence
Dr. Diane Gromala
Dr. Todd P. Chang
Price of ticket includes a hard copy edition of the forthcoming book: “Applied Virtual Reality in Healthcare: Case Studies and Perspectives” shipped for free anywhere in the world ($75 value).
Ticket also includes on-demand access to all sessions at no extra charge for one year. All sessions are available for immediate playback ten minutes after the session ends.
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