Michael Levene, PhD

Assistant Professor, Biomedical Engineering

Mentor

Brian Smith, MD

Background

Dr. Levene is an Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering.  He received his PhD in Computation and Neural Systems from California Institute of Technology.  Prior to his current position, he was a Research Associate at Cornell University.  Dr. Levene’s long-term career plan is to develop a research program based on the application of optical technologies to clinically relevant problems.

Project Summary

Dr. Levene’s project, Measurement of von Willebrand Factor Multimer Distributions,  proposes the development of fluorescence fluctuation spectroscopy (FFS) for the evaluation of von Willebrand Factor (vWF) multimers as a more accurate and reproducible technique in von Willebrand Disease (vWD) diagnosis, classification, and monitoring, for elucidating specifics about the pathogenetic mechanism of thrombotic thrombocytopenia purpura (TTP), and as a new tool for assessment of coagulation or bleeding risk in a variety of common systemic conditions.