Ibolja Cernak is an American researcher in blast wave injury.
Cernak concluded in the 1990s that soldiers who had been subjected to blasts were suffering from traumatic brain injury (TBI), while most still considered their invisible injuries to be Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome (PTSD), and to be psychological rather than physical.
She collected blood samples from soldiers and did a study cataloging the neurological effects of blast on 1,300 recruits.
[1] Although she presented her findings at conferences, it was not until the mid 2000s that other medical professionals began to understand the physical nature of the blast injury.
[2] She was Medical Director and Principal Professional Staff at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, where she did research into the effects of blasts on bodies.