Elliott Rouse

Background

About Elliott Rouse

Dr. Rouse is an Associate Professor in the Departments of Robotics and Mechanical Engineering at the University of Michigan, where he directs the Neurobionics Lab. The vision of his group is to discover the fundamental science that underlies human joint dynamics during locomotion and incorporate these discoveries in a new class of wearable robotic technologies. The Lab uses technical tools from mechanical and biomedical engineering applied to the complex challenges of human augmentation, physical medicine, rehabilitation and neuroscience. Dr. Rouse and his research have been featured at TED, on the Discovery Channel, CNN, National Public Radio, Wired Magazine UK, Business Insider, among others. He is a recipient of the NSF CAREER Award in 2019. Dr. Rouse is a member of the Robotics and Automation Society and the Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, as well as the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. He is a member of the EMBS Technical Committee on Biorobotics, and is on the Editorial Boards of Transactions on Biomedical Engineering and Robotics and Automation Letters. He is dedicated to effective student mentoring and training, as well as translating his research to the public through entrepreneurship; he holds patents for the design and control of wearable robotic systems. Dr. Rouse received the BS degree in mechanical engineering from The Ohio State University in 2007, and the MS and PhD degrees in biomedical engineering from Northwestern University in 2009 and 2012, respectively. Subsequently, he joined the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a Postdoctoral Fellow, working with the Biomechatronics Group in the MIT Media Lab. Prior to joining the University of Michigan, Dr. Rouse was faculty in the School’s of Medicine and Engineering at Northwestern University, and a Research Scientist at the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab (formerly the RIC). In 2019 – 2020, Dr. Rouse was a visiting faculty member at (Google) X and co-founded their exoskeleton team. In 2024, he joined the Boston Dynamics AI Institute on sabbatical. More information can be found on his lab website.