Bio

Chethan Pandarinath is a tenured Associate Professor in the Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering and Neurosurgery at Emory University and Georgia Tech. He directs the Systems Neural Engineering Lab, whose research sits at the intersection of neural engineering, systems neuroscience, and artificial intelligence, with dual goals of better understanding the nervous system and designing assistive devices for people with paralysis.

Dr. Pandarinath received undergraduate degrees in Computer Engineering, Physics, and Science Policy from NC State. During his PhD in EE at Cornell, his research focused on the early visual system and creating novel retinal prosthetic approaches to restore vision. His postdoc at Stanford with Jaimie Henderson and Krishna Shenoy, as a part of the BrainGate clinical trial, focused on improving the performance of brain-computer interfaces to restore function to people with paralysis due to spinal cord injury and ALS. He is a 2019 Sloan Fellow and K12 Scholar in the NIH-NICHD Rehabilitation Engineering Career Development Program. He is also a recipient of the 2021 NIH Director’s New Innovator Award (DP2). His work has been funded by the Neilsen Foundation, NSF, DARPA, Air Force, Burroughs Wellcome Fund, Simons Foundation, and NIH.

For Fall ‘24-Spr ‘25, Dr. Pandarinath is on sabbatical as a research scientist at Meta (Reality Labs), working on neuromotor interfaces. He has 20% time dedicated to managing his Emory/GA Tech team.

Research Philosophy

As a researcher, the mission of my lab is to produce work that truly advances the fields of neuroengineering and neuroscience, develops novel strategies and devices to treat disorders of the nervous system, expands our knowledge of the brain, and never compromises in quality and scientific integrity. Concurrently, we aim to provide rigorous academic training to scholars who will go on to have impactful careers (in academia, industry, or more broadly).

I expect my lab members to be driven, focused, and passionate about their work. My goal as a mentor is to ensure that my trainees are working on projects that align with their long-term goals and interests. I will, to the best of my ability, strive to keep roadblocks out of their way so they can focus on producing the highest quality research possible. Above all, my goal is to create an openly collaborative research environment where the research team is happy and productive.

Lab Manual

A really good introduction to our lab philosophy, culture, and expectations can be found in the Lab Manual. (Note: this is a work in progress.)

Consulting/Disclosures

Dr. Pandarinath is also a Research Scientist at Meta Platforms Inc. (Reality Labs).