Keynote speaker: Advancing precision medicine through biomedical imaging

Roderic I. Pettigrew, MD, PhD, is the first Director of the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering at the NIH. Prior to his appointment at the NIH, he was Professor of Radiology, Medicine (Cardiology) at Emory University and Bioengineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Director of the Emory Center for MR Research, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, Georgia. Dr. Pettigrew is known for his pioneering work at Emory University involving four-dimensional imaging of the cardiovascular system using magnetic resonance (MRI). Dr. Pettigrew graduated cum laude from Morehouse College with a B.S. in Physics, where he was a Merrill Scholar. He earned an M.S. in Nuclear Science and Engineering from Rennselear Polytechnic Institute; and a PhD in Applied Radiation Physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was a Whitaker Harvard-MIT Health Sciences Scholar. Subsequently, he received an MD from the University of Miami School of Medicine in an accelerated two-year program, did an internship and residency in internal medicine at Emory University and completed a residency in nuclear medicine at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Pettigrew then spent a year as a clinical research scientist with Picker International, the first manufacturer of MRI equipment, where he helped develop their first cardiac imaging technology. In 1985, he joined Emory as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Fellow with an interest in non-invasive cardiac imaging. His current research focuses on integrated imaging and predictive biomechanical modeling of coronary atherosclerotic disease. Dr. Pettigrew's awards include membership in Phi Beta Kappa, the Bennie Award (Benjamin E. Mays) for Achievement, and being named the Most Distinguished Alumnus of the University of Miami (1990). He was the Radiological Society of North America's 75th Diamond Jubilee Eugene P. Pendergrass New Horizons Lecturer. He is also the recipient of the Herbert Nickens Award of the ABC, the Pritzker Distinguished Achievement Award of the Biomedical Engineering Society, and the Distinguished Service Award of the National Medical Association. He has been elected to membership in two components of the US National Academies: the Institute of Medicine, and the National Academy of Engineering.