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The 2026 Anthony F. DiMarco MD Lecture “Restoring Respiratory Motor Function after Spinal Cord Injury” will be given by Carlos B. Mantilla, MD, PhD. Dr. Mantilla is a consultant and previous chair in the Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, where he also holds a joint appointment in the Department of Physiology and Biomedical Engineering.
Dr. Mantilla’s research focuses on the neural basis for the control of breathing in humans. The long-term goal of Dr. Mantilla’s research team is to develop rational and effective therapies for the treatment of diseases that impair the ability to breathe independently. Dr. Mantilla is working to better understand how to restore the full complement of respiratory function to people with spinal cord injury. Ongoing studies use exciting new information on the mechanisms underlying recovery of respiratory function to explore novel therapies for patients with spinal cord injury. In additional studies, Dr. Mantilla’s team is examining the impact of different families of growth factors (e.g., neurotrophins and neuregulins) in the regulation of the respiratory motor system to improve function and prevent complications in patients with neuromuscular disorders.
In addition to his clinical and research activities, Dr. Mantilla is active in education and provides mentorship to many undergraduate students, anesthesiology residents, and research fellows, among others.
Dr. Mantilla’s research has been funded by the National Institutes of Health and the Paralyzed Veterans of America Research Foundation, and other organizations.
The Anthony F. DiMarco MD Award is given each year during the ASIA annual conference in the area of respiratory medicine to foster research in spinal cord injury. The Award was established in 2019 by a donation from Dr. Anthony F. DiMarco, Professor of Medicine, Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Physiology and Biophysics at Case Western Reserve University. For more than two decades, Dr. DiMarco has been a leader in researching the restoration of respiratory muscle function in persons with spinal cord injury. He has received more than $17 million in funding as a Principal Investigator by the National Institutes of Health and the Food & Drug Administration over the past 25 years.
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Past Anthony F. DiMarco MD Award Recipients |
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| 2025 | Lexi Soltesz, Doctoral Student | PhD student in the Translational Neuroscience Program at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan |
| 2024 | Kajana Satkunendrarajah, PhD | Associate Professor in the Department of Neurosurgery at the Medical College of Wisconsin |
| 2022 | C. Kevin Park, MD | Board-certified internist in Salt Lake City, Utah, specializing in SCI |
| 2021 | Michelle Trbovich, MD | Assistant Professor at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, Department of Rehabilitation |
| 2020 | Ronald J. Cotton, MD, PhD | Assistant Professor at Northwestern University Clinician-Scientist within the Center for Bionic Medicine at Shirley Ryan AbilityLab. |
| 2019 | Audrey Chun, MD | Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai (ISMMS) |
| 2019 | Chris Cherian, MD | Rutgers New Jersey Medical School/Kessler Institute for Rehabilitation in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation |
.Award Rules and Eligibility
The submission deadline for the Anthony F. DiMarco MD Award is the closing date for the General ASIA Call for Abstracts.
