Dr. Peter G. Alexander is the Assistant Director of the Center for Cellular and Molecular Engineering and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the University of Pittsburgh. Dr. Alexander received his BS/BA in Biology/Studio Art from Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC, and his PhD in Developmental Biology and Teratology from Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, PA. He conducted his postdoctoral training in the Cartilage Section and a research fellowship in the Osteoarthritis Section, both at the NIH/NIAMS, Bethesda, MD. Active areas of research that he is pursuing include the customized fabrication of condylar osteochondral tissue for joint surface repair; the development of a novel cell-based therapeutic agent for the prevention and treatment of osteomyelitis; trauma-induced heterotopic ossification: cellular and molecular targets for clinical intervention, etc. Dr. Alexander’s work received honors, which include the 2018 Best Paper, European Society for Sports Traumatology, Knee Surgery and Arthroscopy (ESSKA), Glasgow, Scotland, and the 2019 John J. Joyce Award, International Society of Arthroscopy, Knee Surgery and Orthopaedic Sports Medicine (ISAKOS), Cancun, Mexico.
Dr. Gwendolyn Sowa is the Co-Director of the Ferguson Laboratory for Orthopaedic and Spine Research at the University of Pittsburgh and holds joint appointments in the Departments of Orthopaedic Surgery and Bioengineering. She received her BS in Chemistry from Lafayette College, her MD, and PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and completed a PM&R Residency at Northwestern University. She is Board Certified in Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation. Her Research and Clinical Interests mainly include low back pain, the mechanobiology of the intervertebral disc, the molecular biomarkers of low back pain, and phenotyping chronic low back pain.
Prof. Nam V. Vo is a Professor and the Deputy Vice Chair of Research, and the Co-Director of the Ferguson Laboratory for Orthopaedic and Spine Research at the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, the University of Pittsburgh. He received his PhD with Dr. Michael Chamberlin in Biochemistry from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1998. He completed his post-doctoral training with Dr. Michael Lai at the University of Southern California in 2003. His doctorate research involved detailed molecular analyses of the early stages of E. coli transcription. He continued his training by studying the mechanism and regulation of hepatitis C virus RNA replication, initially as a postdoctoral fellow and subsequently as an assistant specialist to Dr. Caroline Kane at the University of California at Berkeley. Dr. Vo also taught Introductory Microbiology at Contra Costa College in 2005–2006. Dr. Vo joined the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery of UPMC as a research assistant professor in 2006. His research interests include the Biology of musculoskeletal healthy aging, the Biology of intervertebral disc aging and degeneration, the Biology of low back pain through deep biomarker phenotyping, and the Development of therapeutics for intervertebral disc degeneration and low back pain.
Dr. Joon Y. Lee is a Professor at the Ferguson Laboratory for Spine Research, Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, the University of Pittsburgh. He specializes in cervical, thoracic, and lumbar spine surgery in the greater Pittsburgh area. Dr. Lee graduated summa cum laude from the University of California, Berkeley, and obtained his medical degree from Yale Medical School. He completed his residency in orthopedic surgery at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, PA. He completed his fellowship in spine surgery at the Rothman Institute-Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia. Dr. Lee has been involved in research at the National Institutes of Health, Yale Medical School Research Laboratories, and the Orthopaedic Research Laboratory at the University of Pittsburgh. He has authored numerous articles and lectured extensively on topics such as cervical disc herniation, cervical myelopathy, cervical disc replacement, lumbar disc herniation, lumbar spinal stenosis, lumbar disc replacement, spinal fusion, spine trauma, microsurgical decompression, and non-fusion technologies.
