Speakers

Saleet Jafri is a Professor at the School of Systems Biology, College of Science at George Mason University. He received his BS in Mathematics from Duke University in 1986, and his MS in Mathematics from the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University in 1989. In 1993, he received his PhD in Biomedical Sciences from the City University of New York, Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, where he worked as a Scientific Programmer/Analyst performing conformational analysis of protein using combinatorial energy minimization techniques. Saleet Jafri has numerous scientific publications in the areas of calcium signaling, cardiac excitation-contraction coupling, and mitochondrial energy metabolism.

Brendon Dibella earned a B.S. in Economics from the U.S. Naval Academy and an M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School with a concentration in marketing. He is currently a senior sales representative of cardiac rhythm management products with Boston Scientific Corporation, a global leader in the medical device industry providing innovative, minimally invasive, and cost-effective products and services for the treatment of cardiovascular and vascular disease. Brendon has been certified as a cardiac device specialist from the International Board of Heart Rhythm Examiners (IBHRE).

Brendon’s sales experience has focused on learning and selling advanced technologies: cardiac devices; financial messaging (banking and securities markets); and computer enterprise solutions (servers and storage). Brendon has also managed, trained, and evaluated teams in both business and military roles during his previous experience as a naval officer aboard two warships in the Atlantic Fleet and working in financial services in New York City.

Chris Gray graduated with a BA in Biomedical Engineering from the Johns Hopkins University in 1989 with a concentration in materials science. She received her MD from Northwestern University Medical School in 1993. She completed internship in surgery at NMCSD and reported aboard the USS McKee AS-41 in 1994 as the Medical Department Head.
She completed Urology Residency at NMCSD in 2001 and then was the Department Head of Urology at Naval Hospital Bremerton in Washington State. She deployed to Fleet Hospital 8 in Rota, Spain in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Shortly after her return she reported to the National Naval Medical Center where she served as an attending urologist.
From 2006-2008 she completed fellowship in Female Pelvic Medicine and Reconstructive Surgery at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, then returned to the National Naval Medical Center where she was the intern advisor and later the President of the Medical Staff. She currently is the Executive Assistant to the Commander, Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.
She strongly believes that the systems based learning which is inherent to engineering education is fundamental to understanding healthcare networks as well as biology and pathophysiology. She has published papers on diverse topics related to urology including prostate cancer, urinary incontinence, and pelvic organ prolapse.
She is happily married to CAPT Stephen T Sears, a radiologist. They have 2 children, Andrew, aged 9, and Gabrielle aged 7.

Julia Bucheger earned a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from Marquette University. She is currently a District Service Manager in the Cardiac Rhythm Disease Management Division (CRDM) of Medtronic, Inc., the world leader in medical technology and pioneering therapies. The CRDM division specializes in implantable pacemakers, defibrillators, cardiac resynchronization therapy devices, and cardiac monitors.

Julia has held a variety of positions within Medtronic’s CRDM division over the last twelve years. She worked in product development for three years as a Systems Engineer, following the product from systems testing through market release working with engineering, clinical, marketing and technical services. She then moved to the Sales Division as a Technical Field Engineer and was in that position for four years. In that role, Julia was the technical expert for all products and the educator for the sales team on new products and new employees training. She was certified as cardiac device specialist from the International Board of Heart Rhythm Examiners (IBHRE). In her current role as District Service Manager, Julia manages the service and sales support team, and has been in this role for five years.

Manuel graduated from Duke University in May 2010 with a Bachelor of Science degree in biomedical engineering. While at Duke he was involved with a variety of research projects both within his major and across other engineering disciplines. His BME research focused primarily on medical imaging technologies, including independent study projects on functional MRI in post-CABG patients, a temperature-dependent timer for manually-developed x-ray images, and the design of a small-animal ventilator for hyperpolarized gas MRI. After graduating, he began working with St. Jude Medical in their Cardiac Rhythm Management and Atrial Fibrillation divisions. He is part of a 2-year program designed to cross-train employees on St. Jude’s pacemaker and defibrillator technologies as well as the imaging software they’ve designed for use during cardiac ablation procedures. He is nearing the end of the training program, so most days are spent in operating rooms and electrophysiology labs at local hospitals as a technical support specialist for both technology divisions.