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CV

Ilke received her Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Bogazici University, where her research focused on microbubble dynamics and ultrasound-mediated drug delivery for cancer treatment. She is currently a postdoctoral researcher at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, working on patient-specific computational modeling of cardiovascular mechanics, with a focus on cardiac biomechanics, finite element simulations, and congenital heart disease.

Holds a BSc in Physics from Koç University, Istanbul. He is pursuing a PhD in Biomedical Engineering at The Ohio State University.

ucar.17@osu.edu

She graduated with a 3rd ranking from Istanbul Kültür University, Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, and also completed a minor program in Mathematics-Computer Science in 2018. She received the M.Sc degree at the department of Molecular Biology and Genetics (The Molecular Biology of Cancer) from the same university in 2020. During both her undergraduate and master studies, she has also gained hands-on experience of wet-lab techniques and cell culture while working on various research projects. She and her colleagues were awarded to master research project support funded by TUBITAK (1001) in 2018. Currently, she is a PhD student in Bio-Medical Sciences and Engineering program at Koç University. As a part of Prof. Kerem Pekkan’s Biofluids and Cardiovascular Mechanics Lab group, her research focus is the investigation of cardiovascular development particularly the complex biomechanical mechanisms that links heart and vascular morphology, myocytes to mechanical loading in the Left atrial ligation (LAL) avian embryo model. She is also involved in the heart valve studies. In addition, she is a TUBITAK (2247A) Ph.D. scholarship holder. Her research interests are: Cardiovascular development biology, clinical congenital heart defects, microsurgical interventions on model organism, mechanobiology cell-matrix, biomaterials, primary cell culture, tissue and cell engineering, computational biological data analysis, genetic manipulations, imaging techniques such as confocal and fluorescence microscope.

I received my undergraduate education from Istanbul Kultur University, Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, in 2018. I completed a minor in Mathematics and Computer Science in the same year. In 2020, I received my Master's (M.Sc.) degree in Molecular Biology and Genetics from the same university. Currently, I am a PhD student at Koç University, Department of Biomedical Sciences and Engineering. I am working in a multidisciplinary Biofluids and Cardiovascular Mechanics (BCM) research laboratory supported by the European Research Council, TÜBİTAK 2247-A (National Leader Project), and Koç University. My research focuses on studies of embryonic development, cardiac developmental biology, mechanobiology, and heart valve biology related to congenital heart defects (CHD). For this purpose, I conduct in ovo and in vitro studies by creating heart defects with microsurgical applications in avian embryonic hearts. Additionally, I characterize disease models using various molecular biology and imaging techniques to better understand the hemodynamic environment, cardiac extracellular matrix remodeling, and biomechanical regulation of cardiomyocytes through microsurgery and genetic approaches.

PhD Candidate studying in Koç University. Current works focus on patient-specific cardiovascular fluid mechanics applications and fluid mechanics in biomedical devices. Mainly focuses on computational fluid dynamics.

Demet Kul is a Research and Teaching Assistant at Koç University’s School of Medicine and Graduate School of Health Sciences. She earned her B.Sc. in Bioengineering from Ege University and her M.Sc. in Bioengineering from Izmir Institute of Technology, where she conducted research on cytotoxic natural compounds and their biochemical mechanisms. She has been involved in various interdisciplinary projects including 3D tumor spheroid angiogenesis models using microfluidic cartridges, and pilot-scale production of bioactive natural compounds. Her research experience spans biochemistry, natural product chemistry, 3D cell culture systems, and drug response studies. Her current research focuses on the development of biocompatible heart valve constructs and emphasis on applications related to the Ozaki procedure. She is particularly interested in biomaterials, cardiovascular tissue engineering, and translational applications in cardiac surgery.

Melis is a direct PhD student in Biomedical Sciences and Engineering at Koç University. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in Biomedical Engineering as an honor student from Istanbul Medipol University in 2022. With extensive experience as a research assistant and teaching assistant, her work focuses on microfluidic systems, blood pump hands on experiments, and gene delivery platforms. Her research integrates biofluid mechanics with advanced imaging techniques like Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) to develop innovative biomedical solutions.

Kairaa is an undergraduate Biomedical Engineering student at The Ohio State University. Originally from Dubai, her academic interests lie at the intersection of biomaterials and biomechanics, with a focus on designing next-generation medical technologies.