The Brain Surgeon's Take

EJ Manuel, a former first-round NFL Draft pick, joined ACC Network in 2019 and is a studio analyst on The Huddle, ACCN’s signature football show that airs Saturday mornings throughout the fall. He also co-hosts ACCN’s In Play with Kelsey Riggs and is a regular each week on ESPN’s College Football Live. Along with is his ESPN duties, Manuel co-hosts College Sports Today on SiriusXM with Brock Huard.

One of the most productive quarterbacks in Florida State history, Manuel led the Seminoles to a 25-6 record as a starter during the 2009-12 seasons, and the fourth-most wins in program history. The Virginia Beach, Virginia, native also helped Florida State to notable victories including the 2013 Discover Orange Bowl, 2012 Dr Pepper ACC Football Championship Game and 2009 Gator Bowl – the final game of legendary coach Bobby Bowden’s career. He is the second quarterback in FBS history to win four straight bowl games, and also went 15-3 in his career against ACC opponents. Manuel is FSU’s all-time leader in completion percentage (66.9), which is tied for third in ACC history, and ranks among the top five Seminole quarterbacks all-time for passing yards (7,736, 4th), total offense (8,563, 3rd), completions (600, 3rd) and attempts (897, 5th), despite only two seasons as the full-time starter. He earned second team All-ACC honors for the 2012 season and was named the 2013 Senior Bowl MVP.

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Dr. Shah aims to educate people across the globe on basic dermatology and skincare to empower them to make informed decisions about their skin health. He has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Allure, Cosmopolitan, Vogue, Yahoo News, NBC News, Fox News, Bustle Magazine, Byrdie Magazine, ABC, Nylon Magazine, Greatist, Medscape, Khaleej Times, Wired, Glossy, Mic, and Entrepreneur... among many others. You can find him educating his 17 million followers on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube.

He is an editor for the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology (JAAD), sits on several professional dermatology committees including the American Society of Dermatologic Surgery (ASDS), and participates in the Healthcare Leaders in Social Media Roundtable with the White House in Washington, DC.

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The attacks of September 11, 2001, prompted the creation of a robust and deadly special operations force — Task Force Dagger. Alan C. Mack, Callsign Razor 03, led one of two teams of MH-47E helicopters and armed MH-60s. Their two-fold mission – Personnel Recovery (PR) and Unconventional Warfare(UW) involved flying in terrain and weather previously not thought possible. But, if that wasn’t enough, they pushed the flight envelope of their specially modified Chinooks to the limit and beyond. Alan shares his behind-the-scenes perspective of the Horse Soldier’s infil into Afghanistan. He discusses the hunt for Usama Bin Laden at Tora Bora and describes his shootdown during Operation Anaconda. Years later, he chased Bowe Bergdahl, rescued hostages in Iraq, and the Lone Survivor from the Kunar Valley.

CW5 Alan C. Mack is a Master Aviator with more than 6700 hours of flight time, of which over 3200 hours were flown with Night Vision Goggles. Alan C. Mack’s awards include Legion of Merit, 2 Distinguished Flying Crosses, 3 Bronze Star Medals, 3 Meritorious Service Medals, 10 Air Medals; one with Valor device, Combat Action Badge, and the Army Broken Wing award.

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Dr Greer is the Founding Dean of the Roseman University Health Sciences College of Medicine. Previously, Dr. Greer served as Professor of Medicine, Founding Chair of Humanities, Health, and Society; and Associate Dean for Community Engagement at FIU. Dr. Greer spearheaded the nationally recognized Green Family Foundation Neighborhood Health Education Learning Program (NeighborhoodHELP) and is a nationally recognized advocate for health care equity.

He has received numerous recognitions, including: one of the 500 Most Influential Business Leaders in Life Sciences, June 2019 AMA Foundation Pride in Profession Award; Bob Graham Center for Public Service 2017 Citizen of the Year; 2014 National Jefferson Award; 2013 Great Floridian Award; the 2009 Presidential Medal of Freedom; and in 1993, was honored as a MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant” Fellow.

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Nationally and internationally recognized as a leading neurosurgeon and an expert in cerebral revascularization and cerebral aneurysms, Dr. Langer brings more than 22 years of experience to his highly personalized, direct patient care practice. One of the few cerebral bypass surgeons in the country, Dr. Langer has published award-winning work in numerous peer-reviewed publications and has spoken nationally and internationally on vascular disorders, such as aneurysms and arteriovenous malformations (AVMs) of the brain. A third-generation physician, Dr. Langer attended the University of Pennsylvania to receive both his undergraduate and medical school degrees, where he also stayed to complete his neurosurgical residency under the direction of Eugene Flamm, MD. He later joined Dr. Flamm at a new neurosurgical institute in New York City in 1998. Dr. Langer also completed a mid-career fellowship at the University at Buffalo in cerebrovascular disease treatment, including aneurysms, AVMs and carotid disease. Dr. Langer has been recognized as a Top Doctor and Best Doctor by numerous publications and has a global reputation in neurosurgical excellence.

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Charlton Copeland joined the faculty in 2007. He teaches Civil Procedure I and II, Federal Courts, Administrative Law, and the Regulatory State. In addition, he has served as the Faculty Coordinator of the Florida Supreme Court Internship Program, and the Law School’s Washington, DC Externship Program, where he teaches Federal Policy Making: Legislation, Regulation and Litigation. He is a 2015 recipient of the Richard Hausler Golden Apple Award for the faculty member contributing the most to the student body both academically and through his or her extracurricular activities.

His scholarship has focused primarily on the ways in which federalism as a constitutional and political structure is mediated in: the relationship between federal and state courts, the jurisprudence of remedies for state violations of federal law, and the relationship between state and federal implementation of federal policy.  In addition, he has written about the intersection between law and theology as they relate to religion’s role in American democracy and the framing of liberationist critiques of same sex marriage.  He is a recipient of the 2013 Dukeminier Award and the Michael Cunningham Prize, from the Williams Institute at UCLA Law School, for the best law review articles published.

Professor Copeland is a graduate of Amherst College, Yale Divinity School, and Yale Law School.

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Dr. Mary Beth Wilkas Janke is a former United States Secret Service Agent and current consultant in the fields of forensic and clinical psychology and professor at George Washington University, where she teaches Abnormal Psychology and the Psychology of Crime and Violence. Mary Beth holds a Doctoral Degree in Clinical Psychology, a Master's Degree in Forensic Psychology, and a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice. She is also the author of the best selling book " The Protector: A Woman's Journey from the Secret Service to Guarding VIPs and Working in Some of the World's Most Dangerous Places"

With more than 25 years of psychology, security and investigative work, she has accomplished such varied feats as leading an inquiry during the “Iraqgate” investigation and an investigation for 60 Minutes on the Duke Lacrosse scandal, serving as the only female to ever officially protect a foreign president outside of the United States and creating a Stalking Risk Assessment Prototype for the Stalking Unit of Victim Services in Queens, NY, among others.

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Dr. Thomas Zurbuchen is tasked with helping us answer some of humanity’s biggest questions: Where did we come from? Are we alone? How does the universe work? Dr. Zurbuchen is well versed in the practice of asking difficult questions that help us seek interconnected answers leading to real world impacts. He is keenly interested in innovation and how leadership is developed and how the pursuit of excellence can help change the world.  Dr. Zurbuchen was a professor of space science and aerospace engineering at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. He was the founding director of UM’s Center for Entrepreneurship at the College of Engineering and developed and ran several campus wide innovation initiatives, one of which led to the top-ranked undergraduate entrepreneurship program nationally.

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Dr. Kateb, is a neuroscientist with more than 20 years of research experience. His research has been focused on the introduction of advanced diagnostics and therapeutics into clinical neuroscience in order to rapidly identify and introduce game-changing technologies to treat neurological disorders such as brain cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease. Babak was Director of Research and Development in the Department of Neurosurgery at City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center where he established collaboration with NASA and published and pioneered a technique for brain cancer immunotherapy. While at City of Hope, he received NASA Tech Brief Award for his pioneering work. In 2010, he joined the Department of Neurosurgery at Cedars Sinai Medical Center as a research scientist where he developed a partnership between Cedars-Sinai and NASA and established a clinical trial using NASA technology for brain mapping.

He has been recognized by President Biden, Mayor of Los Angeles, and Governor of California for his dedication to science. Babak has been deeply involved in global neuroscience legislation through his close collaboration with the US Congressional Neuroscience Caucus as well as members of Canadian Parliaments. He has chaired 9 Congressional briefings. He has been one of the key players in President Obama’s BRAIN initiative and co-author of the G20 World Brain Mapping Initiative and the African Brain Mapping Initiative.

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Ken Paller conducts cognitive neuroscience research at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, where he also serves as Director of the Training Program in the Neuroscience of Human Cognition. Ken’s collaborative research with his students and colleagues focuses on human memory, consciousness, and related issues. Recent research articles have examined sleep’s role in memory and memory dysfunction, sensory processing during sleep to reinforce prior learning, the neural substrates of conscious memory experiences, and the juxtaposition of those memory experiences with various ways in which memory can influence our behavior in the absence of awareness of memory retrieval, as in intuition. His investigations make use of various behavioral measures of memory, analyses of brain electrical activity from the EEG, patterns of cognitive deficits in neurological patients, and MRI methods.

Ken received a PhD in Neurosciences from UC San Diego following undergraduate training at UCLA. He held postdoctoral positions at Yale, Manchester, and Berkeley. He is a Fellow of the Mind and Life Institute, a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, journal editor at Neuropsychologia, and program committee chair for the Cognitive Neuroscience Society. He received the Senator Mark Hatfield Award from the Alzheimer’s Association, and research funding from the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, and other federal agencies and private foundations.

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