Pavlos P. Vlachos

Professor of Mechanical and Biomedical Engineering
pvlachos@purdue.edu

Dr. Vlachos is professor in the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue. Dr. Vlachos received his Diploma in Mechanical Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens (1995) and his MS (1998) and PhD (2000) in Engineering Science and Mechanics from Virginia Tech. He joined the department of Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Tech as assistant professor (2003) and he was promoted to associate (2007), and full professor (2011). In August 2013 he joined the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue, and he currently serves as President’s Fellow for Research Development. He is also associate editor for the International Journal of Multi-Phase Flows. His research focuses on experimental fluid mechanics specializing on flow diagnostics using optical or other non-intrusive methods. He has worked on wakes, boundary layers, aerothermodynamics, and fluid structure interaction. Currently his main interests are in biofluids, arterial flows, heart failure, medical imaging, drag delivery; and tissue and tumor micro-environments.

Brett Albert Meyers

Research Assistant Professor
brett.albert.meyers@gmail.com

Brett A. Meyers is a Research Assistant Professor with the Regenstreif Center for Healthcare Engineering at Purdue University. His research focuses on non-invasive measurement of blood flow within the heart, with the goal of developing clinically adoptable, physics-based measurement techniques for determining heart function from medical imaging. With over 10 years of industrial and academic research experience, including a BSME from Drexel, and MSME from Virginia Tech and work related experience at Agilent Technologies and Johnson & Johnson, Brett has more than 10 published/in-process manuscripts, 4 provisional/utility patents, numerous conference abstracts/posters and appears in several media features.

Abeeb Abimbola Lambo

PhD Student
alambo@purdue.edu

I am a Ph.D. student in the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue. I received my bachelor’s degree from the University of Lagos and joined the Vlachos research group as a research assistant in spring 2024. My research interests include cardiovascular flow, machine learning, heart failure, and echocardiogram segmentation methods.

Abhishek Singh

PhD Student
sing1062@purdue.edu

Abhishek Singh is an M.Sc. student in the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue. He received his bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Mandi. His research involves flow visualization in an oral drug dissolution testing system through Particle Image Velocimetry and flow reconstruction of 4D Flow MRI measurements.

Angkon Biswas

PhD Student
biswas61@purdue.edu

Angkon Biswas is a Ph.D. student at the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering at Purdue University. Angkon received his Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) in Biomedical Engineering from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) in April 2023 and has recently joined Purdue University as a Research Assistant in Fall 2024. His research interests include cardiovascular flows, Machine Learning, Computational Fluid Dynamics.

Anubhav Dey

PhD Student
dey24@purdue.edu

Anubhav Dey is an MS student in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and joined the lab in the Fall of 2023. He received his Bachelor’s in Mechanical Engineering from Jadavpur University, India in 2023. His research interests lie in Flow Visualization and Flow Modeling. His current research focuses on studying Nanoparticle Characterization methods.

Brigid Therese Barkmeier

Master's Student
bbarkmei@purdue.edu

Brigid Barkmeier is a master’s student in Mechanical Engineering and joined the lab in August 2024. She received her BS in Mechanical Engineering in May 2024. She conducted undergraduate research in a biomedical application of fluid flow, where she and a team of students developed a lightweight, portable device that heated blood to deliver emergency blood transfusions in austere environments. She looks forward to diving into the experimental side of fluid mechanics and more in-depth biomedical applications as she joins the lab.

Ehsan Rahimi

Postdoctoral researcher
rahimie@purdue.edu

Ehsan Rahimi is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Purdue University with a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering, specializing in high-fidelity computational modeling. His research has focused on multi-fidelity modeling of subcutaneous and intrathecal drug delivery, integrating CFD with PBPK modeling to improve predictive accuracy. He has collaborated with industry partners like Eli Lilly, advancing computational approaches for biomedical applications. He is currently working on lumped parameter modeling of the lymphatic system.

Faezeh Masoomi

PhD Student
fmasoomi@purdue.edu

Faezeh Masoomi is a Ph.D. student in the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University. Faezeh received her BSc in Aerospace Engineering from the Sharif University of Technology and her Master of Science in mechanical engineering from Michigan State University. Her research is focused on studying the aerodynamic of gliding snakes using flow visualization methods (PIV and PTV).

Hyeondong Yang

Postdoctoral researcher
yang2777@purdue.edu

Hyeondong Yang is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Purdue University and joined in May 2024. He received his Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Hanyang University, South Korea in 2023. His research has been focused on cerebral aneurysm-related studies such as rupture risk evaluation, aneurysm formation, and treatment outcomes. Through this, he has collaborated with numerous neurosurgeons and has a high level of clinical knowledge in cerebral aneurysms. He has tried to combine hemodynamics with clinical applications, resulting in more than 10 publications and 10 patents.

Manoja Rajalakshmi Aravindakshan

Visiting Research Scholar (PhD Student)
maravind@purdue.edu

Manoja Aravindakshan is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur. In Spring 2025, she joined the Vlachos Research Lab as a Visiting Research Scholar. She holds a BTech in Computer Science and Engineering and has prior experience working as a software engineer.  Her research interests are application of computational modelling towards digital twinning for human physiological and biochemical processes. Currently her research focusses on lumped parameter modeling of cardiovascular system.

Milad Tavakolian

PhD Student
mtavako@purdue.edu

Milad Tavakolian is a Ph.D. student in the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University. Milad received his BSc (2016) in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Tehran and MSc (2019) in Biomedical/Biomechanics Engineering from Amirkabir University of Technology. He spent one semester (2021) at University of Denver. He joined Aether lab in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University as a graduate research assistant in Spring 2022. He worked on computational study of cardiovascular hemodynamics from Echo images during his master’s degree. His research interests include cardiovascular flows, and experimental fluid mechanics.

Mohammadamin Abazari

PhD Student
mabazari@purdue.edu

Mohammadamin Abazari is a Ph.D. student in Purdue University’s School of Mechanical Engineering. He earned both his Bachelor’s (8/2020) and Master’s (7/2023) degrees in Mechanical Engineering from K.N. Toosi University in Iran and joined Purdue in the fall of 2023. His research interests include patient-specific computational fluid dynamics models for cardiovascular pathologies, drug delivery to tumors, and transport phenomena in tissues. With over 7 published/under-reviewed research journals and conference papers, his current focus is on a technique for measuring velocity fields in opaque flow conditions, especially in clinical applications like blood flow. This involves combining ultrasound echo images with digital particle image velocimetry methods.

Pranjal Anand

PhD Student
anand139@purdue.edu

Pranjal Anand is a Master’s student in Mechanical Engineering. He received his B.E. in Mechanical Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology and Science Pilani, Goa, India in 2022. He joined the Aether lab as a graduate research assistant in Fall, 2022. He worked on aerodynamics and aerothermodynamics projects during his bachelor’s degree, with a senior thesis on flow control for reducing drag on amphibious aircraft. Having previously worked with computational methods, he now looks to understand and improve the experimental side of fluid mechanics.

Reza Babakhani Galangashi

PhD Student
rbabakha@purdue.edu

Reza Babakhani Galangashi is a Ph.D. student in Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University. Reza received his BSc (2017) from Persian Gulf University in Ship Architecture and MSc (2019) in Mechanical Engineering from Sharif University of Technology. He spent one year (2020) at UMass University – Amherst as Research Assistant. He joined Aether lab in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University as a research assistant in Spring 2021. He worked on European Eel and Pond Turtle locomotion experimentally and Numerically during his master’s degree. Recently, he was working on cell migration around stent struts, vibration- and Lymphedema-like condition-induced permeability of endothelial cells.

Rozhin Derakhshandeh

PhD Student
rderakhs@purdue.edu

Rozhin began her direct PhD program in Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University in 2019. Her research focuses on developing innovative experimental techniques in fluid dynamics, specifically, Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) coupled with advanced image processing to address challenges in biomedical flows, particularly in cardiac flow and injection physiology. In 2021, Rozhin joined the strategic collaboration between Purdue and Lilly. Her research has been directed towards enhancing the delivery of autoinjector devices. This involves gaining a better understanding of the fundamental mechanics of the auto-injection process, improving drug bioavailability, and reducing injection site pain, all aimed at promoting better patient compliance and overall health.

Rudra Sethu Viji

PhD Student
rsethuvi@purdue.edu

Ruhi Sharmin

PhD Student
rsharmin@purdue.edu

Shailee Mitra

PhD Student

Shailee Mitra is a PhD candidate in the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University. She received her Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) in Mechanical Engineering from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) in February 2021 and joined Purdue University as a Direct PhD student in Fall 2021. Her research focuses on analyzing cardiac function through blood flow analysis in the heart. Shailee received  the Ward A. Lambert Graduate Teaching Fellowship for Spring 2025 and Fall 2025 semesters. She was awarded the Estus H. and Vasti L. Magoon Award for Excellence in teaching in 2024.

Sourav Das

PhD Student
das139@purdue.edu

Sourav Das is a Ph.D. student in the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University. Previously, he received his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (2017) and his Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from The Ohio State University (2020). He is working as a research assistant focusing on full-field strain measurement of soft tissue for needle insertion using Digital Image Correlation (DIC) analysis and automated tissue Feature identification from histology images.

Syed Muiz Sadat Yashfe

PhD Student
syashfe@purdue.edu

Syed Muiz Sadat Yashfe is a Ph.D. Student in the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering at Purdue University. Syed completed his Undergraduate in Biomedical Engineering in the Military Institute of Science and Technology at Bangladesh University of Professionals in 2023. Following his one-year tenure as a Research Assistant in the BioInnovation Research Group at Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, he joined Purdue in the Fall of 2024. Syed’s research focuses on investigating Cardiovascular diseases using computational Fluid Dynamics with a goal to develop assistive tools in healthcare.

Adib Ahmadzadegan

New position:Senior Digital Signal Processing Systems Engineer, Aeva
aahmadza@purdue.edu

Adib Ahmadzadegan is a Ph.D. candidate in Mechanical Engineering department at Purdue University. He received his B.Sc. in Mechanical Engineering from Amrikabir University of Technology. He received his M.Sc. in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University. His research interests are in microscale flow measurements, microscopy techniques, diffusion measurements, and signal and image processing. He has developed image processing algorithms that enable automated analysis of microscopy images to quantify random displacements, diffusion coefficient, and micro-rheological properties of the environment. He has expertise in micro/nano-particle image velocimetry, particle tracking velocimetry, Fluorescent Recovery After Photobleaching (FRAP), Fluorescent Correlation Spectroscopy (FCS), bacteria and cell culture methods, microfabrication and soft lithography, rheology measurements, code and GUI developments.

Brian Jun

New position: Postdoctoral Research Associate at Los Alamos National Laboratory
brianjun3@gmail.com

Brian Jun received PhD degree at Purdue University School of Mechanical Engineering (advisors: Prof. Pavlos Vlachos and Prof. Luis Solorio) with a crossover research focus in biomedical engineering. Through various academic and industry sponsored projects, the focus of his research has been on developing and applying flow velocimetry and cell tracking techniques to measure molecular transport and cellular dynamics within the tissue microenvironment. His research interests include the tumor microenvironment, drug delivery, microfluidics, and micro/nano-particle image velocimetry. He received his Master of Science in Bioengineering from Georgia Tech, and Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University.

Javad Eshraghi

New position: Advisor, Eli Lilly and Company
jeshragh@purdue.edu

Javad Eshraghi is a postdoctoral research associate at Purdue University and a member of the American Physical Society. Javad received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University. He is a reviewer for the International Journal of Multi-Phase Flows and Energy and Building. As a fluid dynamicist, he has worked on multiphase flows, air-liquid interfaces, measurement science, image and signal processing, and particle image velocimetry (PIV), and he now focuses on the analysis of cavitation phenomena in biological environments using both experimental and theoretical approaches, and methods and analysis of multiphase flows and interfacial phenomena in medical devices.

Jiacheng Zhang

New position: Data Scientist, NeoSoft LLC
zhan1589@purdue.edu

Dr. Zhang is a postdoctoral researcher in the School of Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University. He completed his PhD (2022) work in the Vlachos Research Group, Purdue University. He received his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Shanghai Jiao Tong University (2014) and his Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University (2015). His research interests include the data augmentation and enhancement for flow measurements in clinical and engineering applications. He has more than 10 journal publications and multiple conference presentations in the fields of fluid mechanics, biomedical engineering, and combustion modeling.

Lalit K. Rajendran

New position: Digital Signal Processing (DSP) Characterization Engineer at Aeva Inc.
lrajendr@purdue.edu

Lalit Rajendran was a PhD candidate in the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Purdue University, researching image-based fluid density diagnostics using Background Oriented Schlieren (BOS). He has developed new tools and methodologies that have yielded improvements in the accuracy, precision and spatial resolution of the method compared to the state of the art. In addition, he developed the first uncertainty quantification methodology for density estimation from BOS.  He received his Master’s degree in Aeronautics and Astronautics also from Purdue with work focused on oil-film-based skin friction measurements on swept wings and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Aerospace Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur.

Luis Sanjuan

PhD Student
lsanjuan@purdue.edu

Luis is a PhD student in the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering at Purdue University. He received his Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering at the University of South Florida in Tampa, FL (2021).

Melissa Brindise

New position: Assistant Professor at Penn State (Dept. of Mechanical Engg.)
mcb5351@psu.edu

Melissa Brindise was a post-doctoral research associate in the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University, working with Professor Pavlos Vlachos. She received her Bachelor of Science degree in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering (2013) and her PhD in Mechanical Engineering (2019), both from Purdue University. Her research has focused on experimental and clinically-imaged neurovascular and cardiovascular flow analysis and on methods development. Her research interests include fluid dynamics associated with cerebral aneurysms, traumatic brain injury, and heart disease, as well as transition to turbulence in unsteady flows. She has also worked on developing image and signal processing tools for data denoising, time-frequency analysis, unsupervised segmentation, and autonomous detection of arrythmias. She received the American Heart Association Pre-Doctoral Fellowship in 2017 for her work on cerebral aneurysms. In addition, she earned the Lambert Teaching Fellowship (2017) and Magoon Award for Excellence in Teaching (2018).

Pranav Mohan

New position: Onlien Course Developer, MathWorks
mohanp@purdue.edu

Pranav Mohan is a MS student working on rising bubbles in stratified flows and numerical simulation of vortical cavitation. He received his BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Oklahoma.

Sayantan Bhattacharya

New position: Assistant Professor, University of Maryland - Baltimore County Campus
sbhattac@umbc.edu

Dr. Bhattacharya is a postdoctoral researcher in the school of Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University. He completed his PhD (2019) work in the Vlachos Research Group, Purdue University and received his M.E. (2011) from Indian Institute of Science and his B.E. (2009) from Jadavpur University. His research focuses on the development and uncertainty quantification of optical non-invasive flow measurement techniques (PIV and PTV). He received the Ward A. Lambert Graduate Teaching Fellowship in 2017 and was awarded the Estus H. and Vashti L. Magoon Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2018.

Sreyashi Chakraborty

New position: Postdoctoral Research Associate, San José State University Research Foundation
chakrab3@purdue.edu

Sreyashi Chakraborty was a PhD candidate working with Prof. Pavlos Vlachos in the Mechanical Engineering (ME) Department, Purdue University. She received her BS from the ME department, Jadavpur University, India. She received her M.Tech degree from ME department, IIT Kanpur, India and her MS degree from the ME department, Stanford University, USA. Her research interests include micro-PIV imaging, analyzing flow dynamics in cardiovascular systems in teleost species, and physics-based techniques for clinical echocardiography.

Zhongwang Dou

New position: Assistant Professor at Northern Arizona University (Dept. of Mechanical Engg.)
dou14@purdue.edu

Dr. Dou was a postdoctoral research associate in Vlachos Research Group at the School of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University. He received his Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from University at Buffalo in 2017 and B.E. degree from University of Science and Technology of China in 2012.  Before joining Vlachos group, he worked as a postdoc at the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University and a research scientist at the Canon Strokes & Vascular Research Center. Dr. Dou’s research focuses on experimental fluid mechanics and measurement method development, with applications on particle-laden flows, fluid-structure interactions, biological flows, and biomedical devices.