Current Members

Principal Investigator

Nenad Bursac

Professor of Biomedical Engineering

nenad_dot_bursac_@_duke_dot_edu

(919) 660-5510

Research Scientists

Karen Heman

karen.heman@duke.edu

I will be performing rodent surgeries to support cardiac and skeletal muscle studies.

Renzhi Zhan

zhan0001@duke.edu

I am working on human engineered skeletal and cardiac muscle for organ-on-chip studies.

Hengtao Zhang

zht@duke.edu

I work on engineering of excitable fibroblasts for treatment of cardiac arrhythmias.

Laboratory Staff

Sumie Okuwa

sumie.okuwa@duke.edu

I am the lab manager for the Bursac Lab, and I also assist lab members with molecular biology and cell culture.

Post-Doctoral Associates

Ryne Gorsuch

ryne.gorsuch@duke.edu

Soon Chul Heo

soon.chul.heo@duke.edu

I work on engineered cardiac tissues derived from human pluripotent stem cells.

Alastair Khodabukus

alastair.khodabukus@duke.edu

I work on developing more physiologically relevant tissue engineered skeletal muscle to study both healthy and diseased muscle physiology in human and rat cells.

Hanjun Li

hanjun.li@duke.edu

I study the mechanisms of ion channel trafficking in reponse to biomechanical cues.

Hung Nguyen

hung.nguyen@duke.edu

I work on designing and engineering electrically active primary human cells with customized electrophysiological phenotypes for cardiac repair.

Jordan Pomeroy

jordan.pomeroy@duke.edu

I am interested in the fidelity of the electrical system and the role of fibroblasts in cardiac regeneration.

Lingjun Rao

raolingjun@gmail.com

My current project is focused on generating functional skeletal muscle bundles with cells derived from human pluripotent stem cells for drug development, disease modeling and implantation therapies.

Graduate Students

Nadia Abutaleb

nadia.abutaleb@duke.edu

I am studying the regenerative capacity of tissue-engineered skeletal muscle in vitro.

Swarnali Sengupta Bjergaard

swarnali.sengupta@duke.edu

I am studying how mechanical forces regulate the recruitment and membrane distribution of ion channels.

Abbi Helfer

I work on human cardiac tissue engineering from pluripotent stem cells, and gene editing.

Amulya Kaza

amulya.kaza@duke.edu

I work on human skeletal muscle tissue engineering.

Yanzhen Li

yanzhen.li@duke.edu

I am studying how disease-induced changes in fibroblast phenotype alter the electrical and mechanical function of 3D engineered cardiac tissues and determine the underlying molecular mechanisms.