Rob MacLeod

Rob MacLeod, Ph.D.

Affiliations:

Associate Director, Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute (SCI).

Associate Director, Nora Eccles Harrison Cardiovascular Research and Training Institute (CVRTI)

Associate Chair, Director of Undergraduate Studies, and Professor of Bioengineering. which is part of the College of Engineering

Associate Director of the Comprehensive Arrhythmia Research and MAnagament (CARMA) Center , a new center dedicated to research and clinical care of patients with atrial arrhythmia.

Research Associate Professor of Internal Medicine, in the Division of Cardiology, which is part of the School of Medicine.

Co-Director, NIH/NIGMS Center for Integrative Biomedical Computing (CIBC)

News:

PETA kills 90% of its shelter animals. The best definition of hypocrisy that I can think of.
The physics of Guinness, it is all about the nitrogen!
Biomedical Research Workforce Working Group Report from the NIH.
The Body Weight Simulator from Dr. Kevin Hall's research group at the NIDDK and published as part of The Lancet series on obesity.
SCIx, the first open house at SCI. Huge success! See the video here.
The importance of stupidity in scientific research by Martin Schwartz, a very insightful and liberating article for grad students and all those who live with them.
Rob's work calendar See it and be happy for me that I am so busy.
The care and maintenance of your adviser , an article from Nature for all (my) graduate students.
Pro-Test group at UCLA an organization supporting the humane and approprate use of animals for biomedical research.
Niel and his team with business competion also as webarchive and pdf file
Feature article on atrial fibrillation project on the College of Engineering web site.
Labor statistics for engineers, comparing employment and wages for all engineering disciplines.
National Academy of Sciences Report on Interdisciplinary Research, and a summary article from the Chronicle of Higher Education.
Night view of the world a terrific image.
The benefits of chocolate for cardiovascular health.
The latest on water consumption. Do we drink enough?

Teaching:

Academic Calendars
Canvas Learning System
New class registration rules (pdf) for the College of Engineering

Bioengineering/Physiology 6000 (Spring 2009): Physiology for Engineers

Bioengineering/Physiology 6003 (Fall 2010): Cellular Electrophysiology and Biophysics:

Instructors: Rob MacLeod, Steve Poelzing, John Bridge, Bonnie Punske, Alonso Moreno, Frank Sacshe, Michael Sanguinetti, John White, and Mark Warren
Register as regular course, 3 credit hours, Bioen 6003
Course web site
Syllabus.
Course Announcements

Bioengineering 6060 (Fall 2011): Presentations

Instructors: Rob MacLeod, Veronica Dawson, and Heather Palmer.
Canvas course site
Syllabus (pdf)
Short lecture on grant writing for medical students (pdf)

Bioengineering 6061 (Spring 2012): Presentations

Instructors: Rob MacLeod, Maria Blevins.
Canvas course site
Syllabus (pdf)
Schedule (pdf)

Bioengineering/Physiology 6460 (Fall 2009): Electrophysiology and Bioelectricity:

Instructors: Rob MacLeod, John Bridge, Derek Dosdall, Alonso Moreno, Ravi Ranjan, Frank Sacshe, and Mark Warren.
Register as regular course, 3 credit hours, Bioen 6460
Course web site
Syllabus.
Course Announcements

Bioengineering 6900-009 (Spring 2012): Biomedical Technology in Anesthestia and Critical Care

Instructors: Annette MacIntyre, Rob MacLeod, Lara Brewer et al.
Canvas course site
Syllabus (pdf)
Schedule (pdf)

Research Interests:

See here for more detailed descriptions and images.

Electrocardiographic Mapping:: The recording and analyzing multi-lead bioelectric data, especially body surface potential mapping (BSPM), heart surface (epicardial) electrograms, and intramural potential distributions.
Cardiac Electrophysiology:: The examination of hyper-acute cardiac ischemia and its effects on membrane resting potential, excitability, recovery, and conduction abnormalities. The detection of local changes in cardiac repolarization and their role in the genesis and maintenance of cardiac rhythm disturbances.
Computational Electrophysiology:: The use of computer simulations of the relationship between body-surface potentials (ECGs) and the electrical activity on the surface of the heart (forward and inverse problems in electrocardiography) to reveal and localize electrocardiographic phenomena in normal and pathological states.
Scientific Visualization:: Development of novel computer graphics tools for the display of multichannel bioelectric data, especially the incorporation of computational tools within the graphics environment for the interactive analysis of large datasets.
Bioelectric Signal Processing:: The application of modern signal processing techniques such as temporal and spatial wavelets, three-dimensional interpolation techniques, and statistical estimation to electrocardiographic data with the goal of better signal characterization and the extraction of physiologically important features and parameters. Software design and implementation of large scale processing and analysis tools for biomedical signals.
Cardiac Arrhythmias:: Rhythm disturbances of the heart is a huge topic and my specific areas of interest are atrial fibrillation (AF) and ventricular defibrillation. Projects related to AF are described at the CARMA website and also as driving biomedical projects in the CIBC and the National Alliance for Medical Image Computing or NA-MIC.
Myocardial Ischemia:: This is another disease state of the heart that arises when blood flow is in some way compromised to those vessels supporting the heart. This is the physiology of heart attacks and our approaches include basic electrophysiology, computational cardiology, and even clinical applications (at least once we are smart enough to say anything useful).