O Aung is a medical student at the Medical College of Wisconsin. He earned his BS in biology at Rider University in 2021. He also completed the Doctoral Diversity Program, a post-baccalaureate program at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 2023. He has experience in the areas of circadian rhythms, the influence of timed-restricted feeding on food anticipatory activity, respiratory physiology, obesity, the neural control of breathing, and the innervation of upper airway musculature to find therapies for sleep-disordered breathing, such as obstructive sleep apnea.

Mateus R. Amorim is an assistant professor in the Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine at George Washington University. He completed a postdoctoral degree at the Department of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University (2019–2023) and at the Dental School of Ribeirao Preto—USP (2017–2019). He completed his doctorate (2017) and master’s degree (2013) in sciences from the Postgraduate Program in Physiology at the Ribeirao Preto Medical School at the Autonomic and Respiratory Control Laboratory. He graduated in physiotherapy from the Federal University of Vales do Jequitinhonha and Mucur (2011). He has experience in the area of organ and system physiology, with an emphasis on respiratory physiology and cardiovascular physiology. He is interested in the following topics: the neural control of breathing and circulation, baroreflex, chemoreflex, the recording of autonomic and respiratory nerves and neurons, and systemic inflammation.

David Mendelowitz is Vice-Chair of Pharmacology and Physiology and a professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine (secondary) at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. He earned his BSE at the University of Pennsylvania and his Ph.D. at the University of Washington in 1981 and 1989, respectively. He is an expert in the field of brainstem control of cardiorespiratory function, having published more than 100 peer-reviewed papers in this area. His research career is focused on how the autonomic nervous system and, particularly, specific populations of neurons in the brainstem control heart rate, airway resistance, and other essential cardiorespiratory functions. In addition to understanding the role of these neurons in normal physiology, he also seeks to determine how these neurons and networks are altered to initiate and/or sustain cardiorespiratory diseases, particularly the prevalent cardiovascular diseases of obstructive sleep apnea and heart failure.

Vsevolod Y. Polotsky is a professor and the Vice-Chair of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine at George Washington University. He earned his MD and Ph.D. at the Pavlov First State Medical University of St. Petersburg in 1984 and 1990, respectively. He is a world-renowned expert in animal models of obstructive sleep apnea and metabolic complications of sleep apnea. His research interests include hypoxia, obesity, and metabolic syndrome, and he is currently researching the chemo-genetic manipulation of the innervation of upper airway musculature with a goal of developing gene therapy for obstructive sleep apnea. He is also a former chair of the American Thoracic Society Sleep and Respiratory Neurobiology Assembly. He conducts sleep and breathing research at the Polotsky Research Lab.