Muralidhar Padala PhD, MS, BE

Dr. Padala is an assistant professor of cardiothoracic surgery and director of the structural heart research and innovation laboratory in the Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery. Through the use of novel animal models to manipulate mechanical forces, his research focuses on the mechanobiologic signaling in heart valve disease, heart failure, and atherosclerosis. With this methodology, his lab has developed new devices that can alter the disease state or tissue adaptation to these mechanical forces.

Dr. Padala received his PhD in Bioengineering in 2010 from the Georgia Institute of Technology, his thesis focused on heart valve mechanics after surgical repair with different techniques. He completed a research fellowship at Imperial College London that studied the interaction between mechanics and genetic mutations in valve tissue. His current interdisciplinary research team consists of surgeons, bioengineers, molecular biologists, and veterinarians, and is funded by grants from the NIH, American Heart Association, Coulter Foundation, Georgia Research Alliance, and industry.