IGERT Trainees

2012-2013 Trainees

1. Matt Beall
2. Joey Brink
3. Parker Conroy
4. Andy Pamp

2011-2012 Trainees

1. Daman Bareiss Daman received his BS in Mechanical Engineering from Oklahoma State University. He is hoping to work in the field of mobile robots, particularly tele-operated systems with the possibility of more than one agent. He is the proud father of a very hyper little boy, Devon. Whenever he does happen to find free time, Daman loves to snowboard and skateboard.
2. Courtney Doyle Courtney received a BS in both Mechanical Engineering and Electrical Engineering from the University of Michigan. She received her MS in Mechanical Engineering with research focusing on avain bio-inspired landing gear from the University of Utah. Her passion and future career goal is in animatronics. When not working on robots, Courtney loves to stay active, camp, and travel. She is also a proud member of a local Kickball team.
3. David Dunlop
4. Dara Scher
5. Dustin Webb Dustin received his B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Utah. He aspires to apply artificial intelligence techniques, particularly machine learning, to robotics. To that end his undergraduate research focused on distributed robotic control and motion planning. His bachelor’s thesis focused on applying reinforcement learning techniques to the motion planning problem. When he is not working in the algorithmic robotics lab (ARL) at the university of utah he can be found building robots to play Rock Band, volunteering with Utah First Lego League and Utah’s FIRST Robotics Competition, or spending time with his family, and drawing pictures of robots.

2010-2011 Trainees

1. Scott Almquist Scott received his B.S. in Computer Science and Electrical and Computer Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachussets. He conducted undergraduate research at MIT’s Lincoln Laboratories in acoustic localization for mobile devices. He is currently exploring his robotic research options at the U.
2. Ashley Guinan Ashley grew up in Nebraska, and received her B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2010. She is currently exploring different medical robotics areas with faculty at the University of Utah. Ashley’s favorite hobby is football, and she is becoming a fan of the Utes in addition to her favorite team, the Nebraska Cornhuskers.
3. Raymond King Raymond was born somewhere in England, but has spent most of his life in Virginia. Taking an early interest in the mechanical systems of automobiles and becoming a certified personal trainer at 18 he decided to combine the two interests into biomechanic work. Raymond has a B.S. and M.S. degree from Virginia Tech in Engineering Science and Mechanics with a concentration in biomechanics. He is currently interested in doing research in artificial muscles and human exoskeletons.
4. Katie Miller Katie graduated in May 2010 with her B.S in Electrical Engineering from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where she did research in data compression and control theory. She is currently investigating various areas of medical robotics at the U.
   Nathan Nelson: Nathan was born and raised in the pretty, great state of Utah amidst the mountains and stuff. He is proud of his deep Utah heritage and his uncanny ability to locate it on a map. He has earned his BS in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Utah with an emphasis in System Dynamics and Controls Theory. Nathan is exploring research in medical robotics. His interests and hobbies include mathematics, digital photography, hiking, fishing, and cooking.
5. Erin Parsons Erin Parsons received her B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from The Ohio State University in June of 2010 where she did research in the Neuromuscular Biomechanics Lab. Her undergraduate thesis project was a control system design for a continuous passive motion machine for knee rehabilitation. She is currently pursuing areas in rehabilitation robotics at the U.
6. Andrew Petruska Andrew Petruska completed a BS in Physics and a BS and MS in Mechanical Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania in 2005. When not Biking and Skiing, he has spent the past four years working at ATK Launch Systems designing Ordnance systems for the Air Force’s Strategic Missiles. He is currently investigating several research topics for his thesis area.

2009-2010 Trainees

1. Lisandro Leon Lisandro was born in Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico. That’s the busy border town south of San Diego, California. He spent the majority of his youth living a quiet, relaxed, San Diego lifestyle. Then he left it all to pursue engineering at the University of Southern California where he received both a BS and MS in Mechanical Engineering. Prior to starting at the U, he worked in industry for various defense companies primarily doing research related to electro-optics. He is married to an incredible lady who has given him two, tireless sons. He is also an expert in optimal pressure points for tickling children.
2. Lucas Lincoln Lucas was raised in Maine and earned his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, MA. He conducted his undergraduate research at the Center for Holographic Studies and Laser microMechatronics; where he worked on a laser interferometry system for in vivo measurement of human tympanic membrane dynamics. He is currently exploring projects of interest with the robotics faculty at the U, primarily in the fields of biomimetic robotics and bioinstrumentation.
3. Art Mahoney Art Mahoney is a PhD student in the School of Computing at the University of Utah. He currently is performing research in magnetically controlled, wireless robotics under the mentorship of Dr. Jake Abbott. Prior to attending the University of Utah, Art received a B.S. degree in Computer Science and Computational Mathematics in 2009 at Utah State University. As an undergraduate, Art conducted research in computational search methods for discovering novel cancer therapies, massively parallel graph search strategies, and robotic motion planning. Art particularly enjoys sailing, wooden boats, and anything having to do with the outdoors.
4. Cody Sarrazin Cody was born in Anchorage, AK but spent his budding years in southern Montana. While skiing and moonlighting as a bartender, he got his B.S. and M.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Montana State University; Go CATS! He is currently investigating novel actuation materials and manufacturing processes.

2008-2009 Trainees

1. Brittany Baker Brittany is a native of Utah, but journeyed to the East Coast for her undergraduate studies at MIT. She graduated with a B.S. degree in aerospace engineering in June 2008. Brittany is currently investigating different robotics related projects for her PhD.
2. Mark Fehlberg Mark grew up in Laytonsville, Maryland. He earned a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Virginia Tech while on an Army ROTC scholarship. He then served in the Ordnance Corps at Ft. Sill, OK, where he also earned a M.A. in Managerial Economics. After fulfilling his obligation to the military, Mark was employed by KPMG where he designed computer-based training courses and implemented finance and accounting systems. In 2002, he founded his own business, Initech Incorporated, which has provided financial and systems support services to the Air Force for the past six years. Recently he has decided to pursue a lifelong goal of obtaining an advanced degree in Engineering. Currently, he is working with Dr. Provancher conducting research on the Active Handrest. conducting gait analysis of ROCR, an oscillating climbing robot.
3. Thomas Fountain Thomas grew up in Oswego, New York. He holds B.S. and M.S. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the Rochester Institute of Technology. To date, his focus has been on experimental and computational fluid mechanics in aerospace and biomedical applications. He has held engineering positions at the Air Force Research Lab and the RIT Biodevice Prototyping Lab. For his Master’s research, he experimentally investigated the effects of turbulent shear stresses on red blood cell damage. At the University of Utah, he will be working with Jake Abbott in the Telerobotics lab. Presently he is working with Steve Mascaro on an actuated prosthetic eye.
4. Marshall Floyd Marshall lives in West Jordan, Utah. He earned his BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Utah in 2008. He married Jenni Hunter in 2007 and now has a baby boy named Zavian. He started graduate work in his senior year while inthe BS/MS program, but has since switched to the PhD program. He has long been interested in biologically inspired mobile robots and their diverse applications.

2007-2008 Trainees

1. Jumana Mahmoud Abu-Khalaf I grew up in Amman, Jordan and went to school there. In 2005, I received a B.S. in Mechatronic Engineering from the University of Jordan. Currently, I’m working on the design and analysis of stretchable fingernail sensors for the measurement of fingertip touch force with Dr. Stephen Mascaro.
2. Josh de Bever Josh earned his Bachelor’s degree in Physics and Computer Science and his Masters in Physics from the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada. While in London, he collaborated with a group from the University of Utah developing Magnetic Resonance Imaging hardware, and this eventually led to his discovery of the Robotics program. Currently Josh is doing research with the High Intensity Focused Ultrasound lab which is developing a medical robot that kills cancerous tumors non-invasively and without ionizing radiation.
3. Philip Dyer I’m originally from a small secret town in Pennsylvania. After graduating high school, I was fortunate enough to join the Meyerhoff Scholarship Program at UMBC, where I earned my B.S. in physics and my M.S. in mechanical engineering. My masters research was focused on analyzing gait patterns of cows, which involved many a smelly trip to dairy farms. I’ve since upgraded and am now at the U doing research on gait analysis of people with Parkinson’s disease with Dr. Stacy Bamberg.
4. Mitch Frankel I grew up outside Washington D.C. in Fairfax, VA. I received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Kinesiology with a minor in Biochemistry from the University of Colorado at Boulder in August 1997. I then moved to Bozeman, MT, originally to live peacefully while applying to medical schools. While medical school was not for me, I was able to live in Montana for ten wonderful years enjoying the mountain lifestyle and later pursued a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering, which I received with honors in December 2005 from Montana State University – Bozeman. I am currently working with Dr. Sanford Meek on upper-limb neuroprosthetics, specifically in the realm of multi-DOF electromyographic control and neural signal conditioning.
5. Brian Gleeson Brian grew up in Colorado and received an BS in engineering physics from the University of Colorado. After teaching for a year in China, working for a while, and traveling around, Brian decided it was time to go back to school. He is currently working with Dr. Provancher on tactile robotic interfaces.
6. Cris Phipps Cris Phipps is a Utah native. He received a combined B.S./M.S. degree from the University of Utah and is continuing his research as a Ph.D. student. He works with Prof. Mark Minor on hybrid mobility robots.