Mark Gartner, PhD

Professor of Practice

327 Benedum Hall | 3700 O’Hara Street | Pittsburgh, PA 15261

gartnerm@pitt.edu

Interdisciplinary Design Education

Dr. Gartner’s research interests include interdisciplinary medical product design education. He is the instructor of the two-semester “Senior Design” course in the Department of Bioengineering focusing on the risk-based medical product design process in context of the requirement of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). An interdisciplinary partnership between the School of Nursing and the Department of Bioengineering embeds Senior-level nursing students into bioengineering design teams as the basis for expanded interactions in the clinical environment. This partnership also provides nursing students with an understanding of the medical product design, regulatory, reimbursement, and commercialization processes that can be leveraged in future patient-centric activities. Most importantly, this partnership provides an opportunity to prepare both students for future professional interactions and improve healthcare delivery. This work is supported by a five-year grant awarded by the National Institute for Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (R25 EB025793-01).

Conservation Engineering

Dr. Gartner’s laboratory activities include the development of novel tools to address unmet needs in wildlife conservation and leverages bioengineering and mechatronic principles as the basis for a spectrum of devices and tools. Tools currently in development include an institutional tracking system for green sea turtle rehabilitation, the development of a low-cost manatee tracking device, and a system to allow physical examination of conscious polar bears. Dr. Gartner has

Medical Product Design

Dr. Gartner has led the development of a range of medical products in his career. This work has ranged from minimally invasive cardiological tool through cardiac and cardiopulmonary support systems. Most recently, his laboratory is collaborating with colleagues from the University of Massachusetts in the clinical trial of a vibro-tactile stimulation device for infants with neonatal abstinence syndrome. This technology represents the first non-pharmacological treatment intervention for abstinence and drug withdraw in newborn infants. worked on a range of conservation and education efforts with the Pittsburgh Zoo and PPG Aquarium including recently harvesting coral from the Navy’s Mole Pier in Key West, Florida.

Biography

Mark Gartner earned a PhD in biomedical engineering from Carnegie Mellon, an ME in mechanical and biomedical engineering from Carnegie Mellon, and an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh.