Baltimore Innovation Week 2017

Our team project, "ABSP - Active Bed Sore Prevention," was a creative concept and prototype model to prevent bed sores through a sensor-based pad that may be placed on an existing patient bed. The idea was to detect the location and magnitude of pressure differences, then use a feedback mechanism to create an air pocket at the target site in order to alleviate the pressure. Our presentation included a consideration of the potential for a large public health impact across the world, as pressure ulcers currently result in a largely preventable mortality risk and incur a heavy economic burden.

Olivia is a Information Security Engineer at Mapbox, She works on securing their cloud infrastructure, ensuring it performs well under high demand, and keeping everyone at Mapbox safe and secure. She also is active in the Baltimore-Washington tech scene and organizes CharmCityJS events in Baltimore, MD. She is a First Lieutenant in the Pennsylvania National Guard, working as their Automation Officer where she plans and supports network and radio communications for 500+ users. Prior to joining Mapbox, Olivia worked with various other companies to improve their security posture through automation, testing, and implementation of security best practices. Olivia can often be found playing video games, cuddling her family of pets, or sharing her love of emojis and gifs to the team. She has a bachelor’s degree in mathematics with a focus in cognitive science.

Baltimore, Maryland born and raised, Dr. Jayfus Tucker Doswell, is an African American Ph.D. in Information Technology and a high-tech entrepreneur. Dr. Doswell earned a Bachelor of Arts (BA) from Oberlin College with degrees in Cognitive Neuro-Psychology and Computer Science; a Masters degree in Systems and Computer Science from Howard University; and a Ph.D. degree in Information Technology from George Mason University. His Dissertation, defended in 2005, created the world’s first culturally adaptive artificial intelligent virtual instructor platform that delivers instruction in mixed reality (e.g.,augmented reality and virtual reality) environments. Dr. Doswell is the founder, president, and chief executive officer (CEO) of Juxtopia, LLC, (www.juxtopia.com) a privately held for-profit biomedical and information technology company with a mission for improving human performance®. Prior to starting Juxtopia, Dr. Doswell lead several commercial engineering teams at fortune 500 companies ranging from Lockheed Martin and SAIC to BearingPoint as their senior software engineer. Dr. Doswell has also successfully lead Juxtopia to secure research and development funding for the development of Juxtopia innovative wearable technology products. The Juxtopia® Augmented Reality platform is one wearable technology platform from which various wearable augmented reality products may be created for improving human performance®. Dr. Doswell lead Juxtopia to secure a contract to outfit all U.S. Army combat medics with wearable augmented reality to improve their performance during tactical combat casualty care. Dr. Doswell also invented the Juxtopia® Imhotep platform for creating wearable telehealth products. Doswell ascertains that a significant number of underrepresented minorities in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) are provided apprenticeships at Juxtopia. In addition to his for profit company, Dr. Doswell created The Juxtopia Group, Inc. (www.juxtopia.org) to address the shortage of underrepresented minority populations in engineering and technology careers in year, 2000. Dr. Doswell, observing the painful-problems that prevent high-tech minority companies to achieve $1B markets, created the Juxtopia® Urban Innovation and Cooperative Entrepreneurship (JUICE) Network. The JUICE Network guides high-tech minority companies, colleges, and universities, and federal labs to transition their inventions or innovative concepts to commercial products. From the JUICE Network, Dr. Doswell helped to create Phezu Space, the first African American commercial space company in the United States focused on satellite servicing. From the JUICE Network, Dr. Doswell and two of his entrepreneurship apprentices created the 1 st Morgan State University company, iCrystal, in, at that time, Morgan’s 148 year history.

Natalie D. Eddington, PhD, FAAPS, FCP, is dean of the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy (UMSOP) and a professor of pharmaceutical sciences. She is also executive director of University Regional Partnerships for the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB).

Dr. Eddington is a nationally known expert in drug delivery and pharmacokinetics. Her research focuses on various medications used in the treatment of cancer, epilepsy, arthritis, and drugs of abuse and on understanding the role of biopharmaceutics and pharmacokinetics in elucidating the underlying mechanisms important in optimizing drug therapy. 

Under Dr. Eddington’s leadership, the School of Pharmacy has established a number of centers and programs including the FDA-supported Maryland Center of Excellence in Regulatory Science and Innovation (M-CERSI), which is a collaborative agreement with the FDA to promote innovation in support of the development and evaluation of safe and effective products. Dr. Eddington has designed numerous international regulatory courses for clinicians and scientists from South Korea, Argentina, Brazil, the United States, and Japan on the United States’ drug development process and the FDA regulatory infrastructure surrounding medication and device development. Most recently, under Dr. Eddington’s leadership, the School has launched a transformational pharmapreneurism initiative, which seeks to position the School’s world class faculty, its wonderful students, and exceptional staff to achieve their career aspirations and address our nation’s health care, research, policy, and societal needs.

Founder, Shrenik was motivated to work on Sunrise Health after watching fellow first responders struggle with PTSD and substance use issues in silence due to the social stigma surrounding getting help. After meeting Ravi while at Johns Hopkins, he decided to put his undergraduate education on hold to found Sunrise Health, a mobile application for text-based group psychotherapy that harnesses AI to make mental health care more accessible for patients and more cost-effective for providers. Beyond Sunrise, Shrenik has experience working in business development at multiple medical technology startups, and conducting academic research at Johns Hopkins and the NIH.

Darius Irani is a sophomore at Johns Hopkins, currently studying Computer Science and Applied Mathematics & Statistics. Originally from Upstate New York, Darius has found his home in Baltimore through involvement in his social start-up Project Charmify that does community development, educational programming, and vacant space activation in neighborhoods across Baltimore. Darius would like to combine his passion for social justice issues and technical interests and skills in STEM, by using Big Data and Machine Learning to have social impact in cities and influence social policy.

Dr. Greg Walsh is an assistant professor at the University of Baltimore where he is the graduate program director for the MS in Interaction Design and Information Architecture as well as the UX Design program. He is an interaction design researcher who focuses on user-centered design. In his almost 20 years of Baltimore City residency, Dr. Walsh has worked at a number of Baltimore-based interaction design firms and continues to focus on innovation through mentoring start-ups in the art of user-centered design. He is ruggedly handsome and a recipient of a Google Faculty Research Award.

Aleberry, Managing Partner Gira Wieczorek is a founder at Aleberry, a design & strategy firm focused on helping startups navigate the fundraising process with deck strategy & design. She has helped clients raise over $150M in funding. Aleberry works alongside startups, advisors, venture capitalists, and accelerators for demo days, pitch sessions, and investor meetings.