Associate Professor, Director of Cardiovascular Research Group and Joseph Ip Distinguished Engineering Fellow
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Associate Member
Department of Computing and Software
Associate Member
School of Computational Science and Engineering
Associate Member
McMaster School of Biomedical Engineering
Research Interests
Dr. Motamed’s research interests are in the areas of translational and basic cardiovascular mechanics. Using multidisciplinary research she tries to advance knowledge in biomechanics, fluid mechanics, solid mechanics, medical imaging and mathematical modelling. A major part of her work has been dedicated to development and validation of advanced multi-scale computational-mechanics and imaging-based algorithms for patient-specific modelling of cardiovascular system with the following objectives:
Due to the interdisciplinary nature of her research, Dr. Motamed extensively collaborates with engineers, clinical scientists, surgeons and cardiologists in Canada, USA and Europe.
Description of ongoing research
Despite advancements in surgical/interventional techniques, many cardiovascular patients do not respond favourably to treatments and their life expectancy remains reduced. Abnormal hemodynamics and biomechanics lay at the base of the initiation and progression of many cardiovascular diseases. Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death globally, taking more lives than all forms of cancer combined. It is expected to remain the first cause of death by 2030 in the world. Blood flow quantification can be greatly useful for accurate and early diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases. However the fluid-dynamics methods that can be used as calculating engines of the new diagnostic tools are yet to be developed. Furthermore, as most interventions intend to restore the healthy condition, the ability to predict hemodynamics and biomechanics resulting from a particular intervention has significant impacts on saving lives. Predictive methods are rare. They are extensions of diagnostic methods enabling prediction of effectiveness of interventions, allowing systematic testing for possible clinical solutions, and thus enabling personalization of interventions. The step beyond prediction is optimization of interventions to obtain the best possible outcome. Advancing computational mechanics offers a powerful means to augment clinical measurements and medical imaging to create non-invasive diagnostic, predictive and optimization tools. This is the aim behind a computational cardiovascular mechanics framework that Dr. Motamed’s lab is developing. The framework was named Poiseuille to honour the 18th-century French physicist and physiologist Jean Leonard Marie Poiseuille who provided a mathematical description for blood flow in vessels. Poiseuille is built for three folds of applications: diagnosis, prediction and intervention optimization. Poiseuille has one specific module for each of these applications and one common module that contain shared programs serving the three application modules. Currently Poiseuille is under active development. These developments present formidable mathematical and computational challenges: modeling must incorporate the motion of fluid and the motion of vessel wall, a large network of the blood vessels with complicated geometries, persistent pulse-driven changes in flow and pressure, and in some cases behavior of red blood cells. Poiseuille also provides the backbone for developing new monitoring tools for cardiovascular health to be integrated in future smart houses and smart vehicles.
Multiple openings for graduate students:
I am looking for graduate students with a strong background and experience in designing and building in vitro test setups, prototyping, manufacturing, data acquisition, instrumentation, programming, experimentation (e.g., particle image velocimetry).
I am looking for graduate students with a strong background in image processing or CFD, computational solid mechanics and fluid-structure interaction. Following experience and knowledge are highly favourable: lattice-Boltzmann method, finite-element method, immersed boundary method, 3-D model reconstruction using serial images, image processing algorithms, Fortran, C, and Python programming.
If interested, please send me an email (motamedz@mcmaster.ca) summarizing your education, background and interests along with your CV and transcripts.
Dr. Motamed directs Cardiovascular Research Group and is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at McMaster University. She holds associate faculty memberships in the Department of Computing and Software, in the School of Biomedical Engineering, and in the School of Computational Science and Engineering. She is a member of the Thrombosis & Atherosclerosis Research Institute (TaARI) and McMaster Institute for Research on Aging (MIRA). Moreover, Dr. Motamed is a research affiliate faculty member at the Institute for Medical Engineering & Science and Harvard-MIT Biomedical Engineering Center at MIT (Cambridge, USA). Before joining McMaster, she was a postdoctoral fellow in the Institute for Medical Engineering & Science and Harvard-MIT Biomedical Engineering Center at MIT. She received her Ph.D. degree in mechanical engineering from Concordia University (Montreal, Canada) in 2012 where she was a part-time/adjunct faculty member from 2013 to 2014. She was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Montreal/Laval University (2013–2014). Her research interests are mainly in the areas of translational and basic cardiovascular mechanics to develop long-needed quantitative diagnostic, predictive, and intervention-optimization tools for cardiovascular diseases to support personalized interventions and clinical decision making.
Dr. Motamed is a Joseph Ip Distinguished Engineering Fellow. She serves as the Chair of the NSERC Research Tool and Instruments (RTI) Selection Committee for Mechanical Engineering for the Competition 2021. Dr. Motamed serves on the editorial board of Scientific Reports, a Nature Group journal. She is also a member of the Editorial Board in the Journal of Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology. She is a handling Editor in Frontiers in Cardiovascular Medicine and a Guest Editor in Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology in Novel methods to advance diagnostic and treatment value of medical imaging for cardiovascular disease. She has been a scientific consultant to a number of medical device companies.
She also has 9 years of industrial experience in the automotive R&D sector with a proven record of leadership and project and team management. She is currently using her vehicle design experience to contribute to the development of future smart vehicles. Her group is also working towards developing human health monitoring tools for future smart houses.
| Code | Title | Instructor | Outline | Info |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MECHENG 4BF3 Technical Elective | Biofluid Mechanics Systems |
Dr. Zahra Motamed |
Outline | More |
| BIOMED 762/MECHENG 762 Graduate | Computational Modeling of Circulatory System |
Dr. Zahra Motamed |
Outline | More |
| MECH ENG 762 (TERM 2) Graduate | Computational Modeling of Circulatory System |
Dr. Zahra Motamed |
Outline | More |
| MECH ENG 4BF3 (Winter 2024) Undergraduate | Biofluid Mechanics |
Dr. Zahra Motamed |
Outline | More |
| MECH ENG 2BA3 (Winter 2024) Undergraduate | Mechanical Engineering Measurements (For Mechatronics Students Only) |
Dr. Zahra Motamed |
Outline | More |
| MECH ENG 2B03 (Winter 2024) Undergraduate | Mechanical Engineering Measurements |
Dr. Zahra Motamed |
Outline | More |
