Radiology and Radiological Science

Dr. Weiss is a highly accomplished, world-recognized, established investigator in Interventional Radiology. He has held continuous funding since his initial appointment as an Assistant Professor in 2008, with numerous industrial, foundation, and NIH grants to support his research. All of Dr. Weiss’ research has been translational/clinical and has focused on directly improving patient care. He has done this through: the development of new methods of image guidance for existing procedures (i.e. interventional MRI, Image Overlay etc.), improvement of understanding of existing interventions and their effect on patients (i.e. Vascular Anomalies and HHT), development of new devices that meet unmet needs in Interventional Radiology, and most recently the development of new or improved image guided interventions (i.e. Bariatric Embolization, Y90 radio-embolization for Glioblastoma).

Dr. Weiss works regularly at the intersection of the School of Medicine and Whiting School of Engineering as the Medical Director of both the Johns Hopkins Center for Bioengineering, Innovation and Design (CBID) and the BME Undergraduate Design Team Program. Given his expertise in device design as well as his leadership within CBID, he was selected to co-lead the Drug, Biologics and Devices Translational Research Community within the Johns Hopkins Institute for Clinical and Translational Research and has been responsible for establishing programs and funding research that encourages Device development both at Johns Hopkins and between Johns Hopkins and the University of Maryland.

In recognition of his substantial achievements in Research, Education and Clinical practice, Dr. Weiss has been appointed and elected to significant leadership positions in Radiology organizations at the national level. Most recently, these have included appointments to the role of Deputy Editor of Radiology and election to Chair of the Society of Interventional Radiology Foundation’s Research Grants and Education Division.

Dr. McMahon, who has a Ph.D. in Chemical Physics from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (1999). He has been a member of the Radiology Faculty (MR Division) at Johns Hopkins since 2003. He is recognized internationally for his work on chemical exchange saturation transfer (CEST) MRI contrast agents that are used for cancer and kidney imaging. In particular, he is recognized for developing techniques to measure chemical exchange rates; introducing the concept of multiple-color MRI; and discovering imidazoles and salicylates which have outstanding MRI contrast properties. He is the lead editor of the only textbook on CEST MRI “Chemical Exchange Saturation Transfer Imaging: Advances and Applications”.

Dr. McMahon is a highly accomplished, world-recognized, established investigator in MRI research who works regularly at the intersection of the School of Medicine and the Kennedy Krieger Institute, as Director of the Laboratory of Biodegradable Contrast Agents. With his collaborators, Dr. McMahon has demonstrated the utility of CEST MRI in preclinical models of breast, brain, prostate and colon cancer, methyl malonic acidemia and urinary tract obstructions, and has mentored more than 15 students and postdoctoral fellows. He has held continuous funding since his initial appointment as an Assistant Professor in 2006, with numerous NIH grants supporting his research. Dr. McMahon currently has an NIH R01, is a project principal investigator on the Molecular Imaging in Precision Medicine P41 NIH resource center grant, and a collaborator on three other R01s.

In recognition of his substantial achievements in CEST MRI, Dr. McMahon was elected as Secretary (2018), Vice Chair (2019) and Chair (2020) of ISMRM’s Molecular Imaging Study Group and has also served on ISMRM’s workshop organizing committee. Furthermore, Dr. McMahon was lead organizer of an international workshop on CEST imaging held in Annapolis, MD in 2012 and co-organizer of a workshop on MRI based molecular imaging in St. John’s, Newfoundland in 2019. Dr. McMahon has served many times as a moderator, invited speaker, and discussion leader in ISMRM annual meetings, World Molecular Imaging Society annual meetings and workshops. He has reviewed manuscripts for over 40 journals and abstracts for numerous conferences; serves on the editorial board of Magnetic Resonance Letters; reviews grant applications for several NIH panels, the European Research Council, the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research, the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the Israel Science Foundation, and the National Science Centre of Poland.

Baltimore magazine recognized close to 200 Johns Hopkins physicans as "Top Doctors" of 2020, including Radiology's Nafi Aygun, M.D., Pamela Johson, M.D., Laura Fayad, M.D., M.S., Steven Rowe, M.D., Ph.D., Elliot Fishman, M.D., Harjit Singh, M.D., Kelvin Hong, M.b.b.Ch., M.B.B.S., Lilja Solnes, M.B.A., M.D.

Washingtonian Magazine recognized the Johns Hopkins NCR Interventional Radiologists, Andrew Akman, M.B.A., M.D., Nik Bhagat, M.D., Brian Johnson, M.D. and Abhishek Srinivas, M.D. as Top Docs in the National Capitol Region.

Dr. Zaheer is recognized as a leader in pancreatic imaging. He is one of the founding members of the Pancreatitis Center and the multidisciplinary pancreatic cyst group at Johns Hopkins and his multidisciplinary collaborative research has led to multiple publications in the field of pancreatic imaging, especially pancreatitis. As a national expert in the field, he serves on numerous national committees in the subspecialty, most notably the Disease Focus Panel on pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer at the Society of Abdominal Radiology (SAR) and for American College of Radiology to advise on imaging guidelines for acute pancreatitis.