Amir Manbachi () is an Iranian-born, Canadian-American academic and researcher, currently working as an Associate Professor of Neurosurgery and Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and known for his work in Medical Ultrasound. He is the co-founder and current director of HEPIUS Innovation Lab at Johns Hopkins University.
Manbachi is of Iranian descent. He attended the University of Toronto, where he completed his bachelor's degree in applied sciences (BASc) in the Engineering Science (Physics) program. Later, he obtained his master's degree and a PhD in biomedical engineering at the University of Toronto. During his third year as a PhD candidate, he, along with his university advisers, established Spinesonics Medical which developed a sensor designed to aid in vertebral screw insertion procedures. They received $850,000 of grant funding to support their research and development efforts.
In 2016, Manbachi joined the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University as a research faculty member. At Johns Hopkins University, he co-founded HEPIUS Innovation Labs and now serves as its director. He also served as an associate director of the Center for Bioengineering Innovation and Design.
In 2018, Manbachi and Nao J. Gamo began researching ultrasound technology with the potential to target and "burn" brain tumors. They received a total of $750,000 in grant funding from Hopkins, Maryland Technology Development Corp., and the Wallace H. Coulter Foundation for this purpose.
In 2020, Manbachi and a team co-led by Nicholas Theodore at Johns Hopkins Medicine were awarded a $13.5M grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to research wearable and implantable ultrasound technologies for spinal cord injury patients.
In 2022, Manbachi received Baltimore Business Journal's 40 under 40 award, and secured a Johns Hopkins Discovery award.
In 2023, the HEPIUS Innovation Lab at Hopkins, led by Manbachi, received a Food and Drug Administration Breakthrough Device Designation for a novel ultrasound imaging implant.
In 2024, he received American Institute of Ultrasound in Medicine's Peter Arger Excellence in Medical Student Education Award as well as the Hisako Terasaki's Young Innovator Award.