Ron Riso

Ron Riso's background includes biomedical engineering and neuroscience.  He joined the Biomechatronics group in September 2011 to lead a project that aims to develop implantable devices that provide for bi-directional communication with peripheral nerves. Dr. Riso initially worked with FES grasp restoration for spinal injured subjects at Case Western Reserve University for more than a decade to develop a tactile feedback system for a hand neuroprosthesis. From 1995 until 2003, Ron was Associate Professor at the Danish University, where he continued to work on developing nerve cuff technology to activate otherwise paralyzed muscles in quadriplegia and recorded afferent activity for closed-loop grasp control. While working abroad, Ron was a co-investigator in several large consortium EU funded projects dedicated to spinal cord trauma rehabilitation (“GRIP”) and advanced powered prostheses (“Cyberhand”). As a guest researcher at Professor Roland Johansson’s lab in the Department of Physiology in Umea, Sweden, he studied microneurography and the physiology and psychophysics of cutaneous and proprioceptive sensibilities.   Ron's present research at the Biomechatronics Neural Interfaces Lab involves developing and testing micro-channel nerve regeneration array devices as well as nerve- muscle-graft approaches to obtain prosthesis control commands and to provide prosthesis users with tactile and proprioceptive  sensibilities from their powered  artificial limbs.