Barry Andrew Trimmer is an American scientist, and the ''Henry Bromfield Pearson Professor of Natural Sciences'' at

Tufts University Tufts University is a private research university on the border of Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1852 as Tufts College by Christian universalists who sought to provide a nonsectarian institution of higher learning. ...

. In addition to his primary appointment in th
Department of Biology
he holds secondary appointments i
Biomedical Engineering
and in Neuroscience at the Tuft
Graduate School of Biomedical Science
His research primarily focuses on

neurobiology Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system (the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system), its functions and disorders. It is a multidisciplinary science that combines physiology, anatomy, molecular biology, development ...

biomechanics Biomechanics is the study of the structure, function and motion of the mechanical aspects of biological systems, at any level from whole organisms to organs, cells and cell organelles, using the methods of mechanics. Biomechanics is a branch of ...

neuromechanics Neuromechanics is an interdisciplinary field that combines biomechanics and neuroscience to understand how the nervous system interacts with the skeletal and muscular systems to enable animals to move. In a motor task, like reaching for an object, ...

and soft-bodied locomotion.

Biography

Trimmer was born in England and received both his

B.A. Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

and

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is a ...

from

Cambridge University , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

, concentrating in

. He was a Harkness Fellow at Harvard Medical School, and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California Berkeley and the University of Oregon before joining Tufts University as an Assistant Professor in 1990. He is director of th
Neuromechanics and Biomimetic Devices Laboratory
at

. His research focus is on the ''Neuromechanics of Locomotion'', the science of how animals control their movements. In addition to his work on living systems, Professor Trimmer specializes in the application of found biological principles to the design and fabrication of ''Soft Robots''. Dr. Trimmer is also ''Editor in Chief'' of the journal
Soft Robotics
'. His lab designs and builds a variety of soft robots that are used to test hypotheses about locomotion and to explore new types of control systems. His interests in living systems and robots converge in his recent research that seeks to "grow" robotic devices using a combination of biosynthetic materials, cellular modulation, and tissue engineering. These ''Biosynthetic Robots'' will be versatile, safe, biocompatible and biodegradable. Trimmer and his Tufts colleague David L. Kaplan gained international attention in 2007 upon successfully creating the world's first soft-bodied robot. The robot, or SoftBot, is composed of silicone elastomers and resembles a

tobacco hornworm ''Manduca sexta'' is a moth of the family Sphingidae present through much of the Americas. The species was first described by Carl Linnaeus in his 1763 '' Centuria Insectorum''. Commonly known as the Carolina sphinx moth and the tobacco hawk m ...

, a caterpillar that Trimmer has studied since 1990.In the Lab: Robots That Slink and Squirm - ''New York Times''
/ref> Barry A. Trimmer: List o
Published Work

Footnotes

External links

Tufts Biomimetic Devices Laboratory (BDL)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Trimmer, Barry Harkness Fellows Tufts University faculty Living people 21st-century American biologists Year of birth missing (living people)