Contributing Writer and Social Media Manager
Tulane University School of Medicine
Yichi Zhang is a third-year MD/MBA student at Tulane University School of Medicine in New Orleans, Louisiana. He graduated from Tulane University with a B.S. in Cell and Molecular Biology and a minor in Psychology.
In his free time, Yichi enjoys playing tennis, teaching Chinese, and practicing Kendo.
After he graduates medical school, Yichi wishes to pursue a career in Internal Medicine, with a focus on personalized medicine, all the while building more connections between the American and Chinese medical communities.
Imagine inserting your broken arm into a metallic, sleeve-like device, then sparks fly, machines clang and voila! You have gotten yourself a nice, fixed arm in a shiny new cast. It is more and more common to see scenes like this on display in recent sci-fi productions. These flashy Hollywood gadgets may seem far-fetched, but surgeons have been conducting robotic-assisted procedures for over thirty years.
Robotic surgery has allowed surgeons to perform complex procedures with improved precision, flexibility and control. The advent of robotic surgery began in 1985 when the Puma 560, developed by Victor Scheinman at Unimation, was used to perform neurosurgical biopsies.
Nithyapriya Shankar is an incoming medical student at the University of Queensland-Ochsner School of Medicine. Nithyapriya graduated from the University of Houston with a Bachelors of Science in Honors Biomedical Science. Nithyapriya's previous research experiences include cardiology, maternal-fetal medicine, neuroscience and neonatology. Currently, Nithyapriya is a research assistant in the neonatology department at Baylor College of Medicine/TCH and is assisting with research on the effects of oxygen exposure on premature neonate lung development.
