He received a B.S. degree from the University of Notre Dame and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from The Ohio State University, all in mechanical engineering. He was previously an Assistant Professor at the University of Iowa (2002–2003) and at The Ohio State University (2003–2008). In 2002, he was a summer faculty research fellow at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, CA, and in 2007, he was awarded the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) for his work in modeling human motor coordination and robot-assisted rehabilitation. Areas of interest: machine design, robotics, biomechanics