Short Bio: Atashzar founded the MERIIT Lab at NYU in August 2019. From August 2019 to November 2024, he served as an Assistant Professor in the Departments of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at New York University (NYU). He was also affiliated with the Department of Biomedical Engineering and NYU WIRELESS Center. He received his Ph.D. in 2017. His research interests include applied computer science, robotics, AI, nonlinear and robust control, medical robotics, and biomedical signal processing.
Research at MERIIT Lab is dedicated to developing intelligent interactive robotic systems, AI-enabled control modules, bio-signal processing algorithms, and neural interfaces to enhance human capabilities beyond natural limits. The lab focuses particularly on interactive medical robotic systems. It houses state-of-the-art human-machine interface technologies designed to facilitate bidirectional information exchange between humans and machines, enabling individuals to overcome natural, physiological, and pathological barriers. MERIIT Lab is Part of NYU WIRELESS.
Service: He served as an associate editor for IEEE Transactions on Robotics, IEEE Transactions on Haptics, and IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters. He also organized several workshops and events at IROS and ICRA. Additionally, he was co-chair of the IEEE RAS Cluster of Human-Centered Robotics and served as vice-chair of the IEEE RAS Technical Committee for Telerobotics.
Postdoctoral Journey: Before joining NYU, Atashzar was a senior postdoctoral scientist in the Department of Bioengineering at Imperial College London, UK, supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada. From February 2017 to August 2018, he was a postdoctoral research associate at the Canadian Surgical Technologies and Advanced Robotics (CSTAR) center.
Awards: During his time at NYU, Atashzar received multiple grants and awards from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), including an NIH R01 grant. Previously, he was awarded the highly competitive Ontario Graduate Scholarship (OGS) in 2013 and an NSERC Postdoctoral Fellowship (PDF) in 2018. He ranked among the top five applicants in Canada for the 2018 NSERC PDF competition in the Electrical and Computer Engineering sector.
Updated list of publications: click here