I write this with a heavy heart as it took a lot of courage for me to write this article.

Rao (aka Purna) was my roommate during our graduate school days  before he got married.

I remember the day I first walked into the Razorback apartments in Fayetteville where we were room mates for almost 2+ years while we were doing Masters. He very kind and welcoming and helped me  to get acquainted with the College and American way of life.  He taught me Indian cooking which he was really good at. This is one of the pre-requisites for survival and I am glad he was a very patient teacher.

He brought together Indians and Pakistanis with his large heart and was the President of the Friends of India association. He strived very hard to make sure that everyone got along and kept a high social profile while excelling in academics at the same time. 
  
He taught me about giving through his own example.  He was helpful to everyone beyond imagination.  For example if someone called for a ride from campus to their apartment, even if it was midnight, he would go out in the cold and snow to pick them up and drop them home.  
 
After our Masters, we both met up again at the University of Arkansas' Little Rock campus where we did our Ph.D., under the same Professor, Late Dr. Roger Hawk.  He was the kind of person who was easy going and was like this elder brother who took care of you with his advice on what to do and not to do. After he got married to Asha, he still kept in touch and continued to host parties which many of us Indian Grad students used to look forward to eagerly as both were amazing hosts. 

I will always remember him fondly as a kind and generous room mate.  May his soul rest in peace.

Take care Rao! Hope to meet up with you someday in heaven :-)
Kamesh

This is truly shocking .... Learnt about this at the ISMRM in Toronto, where he was remembered, I couldn't believe my eyes. As always, I was hoping to catch up with him at the ISMRM annual meeting (he visited every couple years) and was deeply saddened by seeing his smiling face on the screen. I knew him and Asha since Picker days, and would frequent dinners at their home. They were a  wonderful pair, he will truly be missed.  Although my prayers will strive for his soul to find peace, I genuinely hope Asha and the kids are coping and continue his legacy of positivity & giving! God bless.
2164261461 x200
Ravi Srinivasan

This is sad news.  I always enjoyed working with Rao, first as a colleague at Picker International and then in his role as one of our MR spectroscopy users at the University of Maryland.  More recently, it was a pleasure to meet him at conferences to share updates and a laugh.  His good nature was a constant and his good humor infectious.  I’m smiling at his memory now.  Rest in peace, my friend.

I am very sadden to hear the pass of Rao. All my thoughts to Rao's family to stay strong. Rao was a wonderful individual and a great friend for so may years since Picker days. I will cherish these  memories for ever.  Rest in peace my friend.

Very sad to hear this news. Rao was a gem of a person. May his soul rest in peace.

So sad and heartbroken to hear of Rao’s passing away. He and Asha were dearest  friends and the kindest hosts. He was always happy, willing and most helpful. I have lost a dear brother. Our best wishes to Asha and daughters.

Rony Thomas 
757 375 0954

Rao has always been a great source of support, not just at work but also in my personal life. When me and my wife went through a difficult time during the birth of our twins, Rao showed great compassion and encouragement. He always took the time to check and see how we were coping with our challenges. My deep condolences to his family, friends and colleagues.

Asha- Sorry to hear about your loss. It is truly unbelievable and shocking. My deepest condolences to you and the children. 

Dr. Rao was always pleasant to work with. His smile was contagious and his disposition consistently kind and upbeat.
Please accept my sincerest sympathies on the passing of your son, husband, brother, uncle, and kind friend. He will truly be missed. 


Gowri and myself we very much schoked to hear the sad demise of our good friend Purna. We're family friends for last 30 years and his loss is unbearable for us. A loving person who is witty and jovial. We stayed in his house when I joined as RA at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences at Little Rock, and had very close interactions with Asha and their daughters. We are going to miss him and the scientific community has lost a good scientist. 
My daughters also had interaction with them. Veena, my younger daughter, even was talking to Asha later year
 She is sad on hearing the demise of Purna.
May his soul rest in peace. 
Jagannathan 

I am so sorry.  

Hearing this sad news caught me completely off guard.  Rao was too young at heart and had so much more to offer.  I can't recall a discussion or interaction with him that I did not enjoy, and I regret that I didn't have more opportunity to work on science together.  A loss for our scientific community and UMD.  

My condolences to his family and close friends and colleagues.

So sorry to hear Sad news, I worked with Rao Gullapalli on some projects when I was in University of Maryland. He is friendly and accomidative with everyone. His compassion and kindness will protect his family. Let us Pray Almighty to take care his family.

To Rao’s family,
We have heard with great sorrow about Rao’s departure. We know how difficult it is to you – every time we met, Rao had something to say about you, his dear family. Our hearts are with you.
Rao was a great research collaborator and a very good friend. We have met for the first time back in 2004, at the Interventional MRI Symposium in Boston. Rao was one of the first investigators who were interested in using the EndoScout guidance system, and we installed the first system at UMMC more than 15 years ago. Since then, we have collaborated continuously on many projects, and have met regularly whenever we were in Baltimore. During our meetings we could hardly cover the topics that we planned to discuss (related to ongoing projects) since it always turned into discussions of new ideas and future collaborations. Rao was very innovative, and we have established several significant collaborative R&D projects. It was a great experience to work with him, he was good natured, always had positive attitude, and the smile never left his face. We have just started to discuss the next topic to work on – the elimination of motion artifacts in MRI of internal organs. It is too bad he will not be around to work on this project, his contributions were so important! However, I know that his attitude and inspiration have been well implanted in the fine group of researchers that he established. 
His memory will always be with us! 
Erez Nevo, Abraham Roth, Amir Roth (his friends in Israel)

We lost a kind human being, an exceptional scientist, and a wonderful friend. Rao taught many of us—including the skeptics—to appreciate the power of functional neuroimaging. Alway with infinite patience, humility, and a warm smile. We'll miss him dearly. 

Adding my fond memories of Rao.  We collaborated on some fun and successful MRI developments, circa 1987-1995, while he was working at Picker, and I was at Cleveland MetroHealth.  He was always a joy to see, beloved and welcomed by all.

Greg Hurst

dear Asha and family - so sorry to hear about Rao. I knew him both as an MRI scientist, and also a tennis player - we had many happy Sunday mornings hitting the ball around. Rao was always cheerful and upbeat, no matter what the score on the court, or (in recent years) what health challenges he may have been facing off-court. He was also always so generous, and we all remember fondly the lovely leaving party you and he hosted for Chris last year (not least for the totally delicious food :-). We will all miss him greatly, and are thinking about you at this difficult time. 
Peter Barker & the 'Sunday Morning tennis group' (Greg, Charles, Patrizio, Josh, Chris and George)

My sincere condolences. Dr. Gullapalli was a wonderful colleague; he would measure no effort to help people. Every interaction with him was productive, pleasant and resulted in a positive outcome. He will be sorely be missed. RIP, Rao.

Dear Asha, Meera and Lekha,
We met a few times at functions held by UMB and the Dept of Neural and Pain Sciences. I have known Rao since he started at UM. He was an integral part of our MRI research on tongue movement, throughout its entire development. Rao was a wonderful collaborator. He was always helpful, thoughtful, creative, and cheerful in his interactions with me and our team.  I only ever heard positive comments about him from all who knew and worked with him. On a personal level, he was a gentle, considerate, man.  Someone I was glad to have in my life. 
I am glad you had such a wonderful husband and father, even though his life was not long enough.  I know you must have so many loving memories of him and I am happy for that.
My best wishes,
Maureen Stone 

Losing a dear friend is losing both your past memories and the ones you would have built in the future. 

I’m so sorry. Rao will certainly be missed!

Juliana Medina

Rukma Aunty and  Gullapalli’s family 
Accept our  heartfelt sympathy  and  deepest condolences to you and family  at this sad time. May Gullapalli Purna Chandra Rao Gari soul rest in peace. 
Praying for you during this difficult time
Benarji and Aparna 
Botswana 


Dear Asha, 

Although I met Purna just last year, I was impressed by his generosity. He was genuinely a great person. I played tennis with him a few times and went on a hike once. I am honored and blessed to have known him. I am sorry to hear of your loss. May God give you and your family strength in this difficult time.

Sincerely,

Puneet Srivastava



I met Rao through tennis, where his good humor, sportsmanship, and enthusiasm were evident in every match. I loved seeing him on the court and will miss him. Thinking of all his beloved family and friends. May his memory be a blessing. Josh Sharfstein

When I heard from Dr. Melhem about Rao's going, it is totally a shock to me as I knew his health situation since his first therapy. He was always optimistic which made me thought he would be fine. To me, Rao was both a great leader and a great colleague. He worked so hard to cover everything. He would write back immediately or shortly after his endless meetings for any request I sent to him.  Most of time, he would call me right the way no matter whether it was at night.  We were about to start some collaborations a month ago as he was aways energetic and planning for the future. He now can have a chance to rest in peace while we certainly will miss him in each corner of the place you loved and contributed significantly!

My heartfelt condolences go to the family!
Ze Wang

Dear Asha and family,

We never had the opportunity to meet but Rao used to talk about you all the time. It breaks my heart to hear about the sudden death of Rao. As we all know, for many years, Rao led Radiology research at UMB as an administrator in addition to being a great researcher. His legacy will endure for a long time. Despite the fact that I recently moved out of the University of Maryland, we still maintain active collaborations. He is co-PI on my CDMRP grant to study TBI with photon counting CT. In this year, we had plans to submit at least two more grants. We had planned to do so many works together.

He was an exceptional human being. It brings back memories of our trip to Nuremberg Germany three years ago.

My thoughts and prayers are with you. I bid you a fond farewell, Rao. I will miss you.

We are deeply saddened to have lost our esteemed group leader and professor, Rao Gullapalli. As a member of Rao's group for the past eight years, I had the privilege of working closely with him and experiencing firsthand his exceptional mentorship. Rao was a kind, wise, and enthusiastic leader who always took the time to listen and offer guidance for my research work. He shared valuable insights on how to conduct research, write papers, and interact with journal editors.

Rao's strong personality and work ethic were truly inspiring. He was always available to help and support his students and group members, often being the first to arrive at the lab and the last to leave his office. He pushed us to work hard and strive for excellence, and his encouragement and support were instrumental in our growth and success. I will always remember the time he drove me home when I missed my late bus home, showing his unwavering dedication to his group members.

Rao's impact went beyond his work as a researcher and educator. Last year, when my daughter volunteered in the lab, Rao went out of his way to make her feel welcome and encouraged her to pursue her interests in science. His kindness and generosity will never be forgotten.

We extend our deepest sympathies to Rao's family and loved ones during this difficult time. He will be deeply missed by all those whose lives he touched, and his legacy as a mentor and leader will continue to inspire us for years to come.


Dear Asha and family, I was so saddened by this news. Rao has been a great colleague and friend over the past 13 years I've known him. He cared so much about everyone he worked with. He was always supportive and open to new ideas. Some of my favorite memories were around helping him to run the Maryland Neuroimaging retreat. He was such a good leader and brought people together. I'll miss his kindness and his sense of humor. I've been lucky to be here in Baltimore this week and spending time with his colleagues, sharing memories. He will be missed by  so many of us and never forgotten. 

I was shocked and sad to hear the news 
about Rao yesterday. We worked together on many projects at The Medical Center.
His smile, laughter, compassion and intelligence always 
made it a privilege to work with him.
My deepest sympathy to his family and friends and colleagues. 


Dear Asha, Meera, and Lekha,
My deepest condolences and sympathies for the loss of our beloved Rao. He was like a brother to me. Together, we built a world class research program in our department.  He always brought positive energy and optimism to our department.  He was passionate about helping faculty achieve their academic goals and extremely caring for his colleagues at our institution and staff in our department. 
He is a huge loss for our department and to me personally
May he rest in peace

Dear family, I am so saddened to hear of his passing and am very sorry for your loss.  I have known Rao professionally for many years and we have sent students to each other when that was best for the student.  Rao was a good scientist and more than that he was a caring and kind human being.  We learned of his passing at the International Society of Therapeutic Ultrasound which allowed so many of us to learn of our shared loss.  Although this is a sad moment, please know that his memory lives on in the hearts of many hundreds of people around the world that he touched.  

It is heartbreaking to hear this. I cannot believe Rao left us because we shook hands and chatted even one day before. As our vice chair and a direct boss for us, Rao is extremely supportive of young faculties like me. I bothered him a lot with request of support letters and he always almost immediately got back to me despite the short lead time. Even a few weeks ago he felt so proud my involvement in a Nature paper and he sent it to our email list and congratulated me. He always thinks in ours position what is good for us. Rao will always be remembered as a dear leader and an example of great mentor!
-Yajie Liang

OBITUARY

Purna Chandra Rao Gullapalli

August 28, 1958 – April 18, 2023

Witzke Funeral Homes Inc.

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