Faculty & staff

I am focused on developing new technologies for brain monitoring and functional imaging.

I am also interested in multi-modal wearable sensors for clinical applications. I am a physicist with a Ph.D. in Neural Computation from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

I was also a Beckman Fellow at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. In 2005 I co-founded Ornim Medical Ltd. A company that developed and marketed the first FDA cleared non-invasive cerebral blood flow monitor.

I started teaching at HIT in 2015.

I am hoping to make engineering a “softer” discipline by developing new courses on soft skills.

• 1992  B.Sc. in Physics (Cum Laude) Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
• 1998  Ph.D. in Neural Computation (direct track), Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
• 1998-2001 – Beckman Fellow, Beckman Inst. Of Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL, USA
   

• Brain monitoring 
• Biophotonics
• Functional brain imaging
• fNIRS
• Wearable sensors for medical applications
• Acousto-optics

In the Biophotonics Lab we use light to explore biological tissue. In particular, we are interested in non-invasive, localized functional imaging of the brain.

We use Acousto-optics to measure blood flow in the brain at different depths. In addition we develop novel algorithms for assessing brain disorders from optical signals (fNIRS). 

We also explore multi-modal, wearable sensors for medical applications such as epileptic seizure detection and dysphagia management
 

• 2017-2018 HIT recognition for outstanding research
• 2016-2017 HIT president award for excellence 
• 2015-2016 HIT award for excellence in research
• 1998 Beckman Fellowship
• 1995 Wolf Foundation prize for graduate students
• 1989,1990 Dean’s list, Faculty of 

1. J.M. Murkin, M. Kamar, Z. Silman, M. Balberg, S.J. Adams Intraoperative cerebral autoregulation assessment using ultrasound-tagged near-infrared-based cerebral blood flow in comparison to transcranial Doppler cerebral flow velocity: A pilot study J. of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Anesthesia, 29(5), 2015 (1187-1193) 
2. A. Tsalach, Z. Schiffer, E. Ratner, I. Breskin, R. Zeitak, R. Shechter, M. Balberg Depth selective acousto-optic flow measurement Biomedical Optics Express, 6(12), 2015 (4871-4886) 
3. M. Balberg, M. Levi, K. Kalinowski, I. Barnea, S.K. Mirsky, N.T. Shaked Localized measurements of physical parameters within human sperm cells obtained with wide-field interferometry J. of Biophotonics, 10, 2017 (1305-1314) 
4. P.J. Eravuchira, S.K. Mirsky, I. Barnea, M. Levi, M. Balberg, N.T. Shaked Individual sperm selection by microfluidics integrated with interferometric phase microscopy Methods, 136, 2018 (152-159) 
5. I. Barnea, L. Karako, S.K. Mirsky, M. Levi, M. Balberg, N.T. Shaked Stain-free interferometric phase microscopy correlation with DNA fragmentation stain in human spermatozoa J. of Biophotonics, 11(11), 2018 (e201800137) [Q1]

• 2015 - Present : Senior lecturer, Faculty of Engineering, Holon Institute of Technology, Holon, Israel
• 2015-2019 : Project manager, Epilepsy – Medial Research Ltd.
• 2015-2017 : Visiting Scholar, researcher, Biomedical Engineering & Ramot (Tech transfer), Tel Aviv University
• 2015 – 2016 :  External Lecturer, Biomedical Engineering ME program, Technion, Sarona Branch 
• 2005-2014 : Co-founder, CTO & CEO : Ornim Medical Ltd.
• 2002 -2005 : External Lecturer, Jerusalem College of Engineering, Jerusalem, Israel
• 2001 : Visiting Research Assistant Professor, Beckman Institute, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.