Ortiz-Rosario, Alexis

Biography

Alexis Ortiz-Rosario currently serves as an Assistant Professor of Practice in the Department of Biomedical Engineering. He is the instructor for the BIOMEDE 3702 Measurements and Instrumentation course that introduces students to concepts of circuit instrumentation, experimental design, and applied statistics. He also serves in the capacity of engineering advisor for senior capstone students and instructs the domain laboratory experiences in bioimaging and micro/nanofabrication. He is also one of the co-founders of the Biomedical Engineering Education Community, a virtual community of practice for BME educators. 

Alexis’ first brushes with engineering began with one day waking up with the sudden realization of wanting to be an engineer. He pursued a bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering at the University of Puerto Rico Mayagüez. During his pursuit, he was involved in the Society for Hispanic Professional Engineers. There he participated, and later led, the Big Brother Program which provided extensive leadership and professional development to a select group of freshmen. He later led the communication branch of the organization as VP of communications managing a 3-member team including marketing, documentation, webpage for the 500+ member organization. He finished his degree with high honors, Magna Cum Laude, in 2011 and decided to go to graduate school.

With an interest to understand the possibilities of interfacing between the body and electronics, Alexis decided to get a Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering. His primary focus was myoelectric prostheses but later shifted into computational neuroscience and motor systems. His research entailed improving electrophysiological signal detection in different parts of the brain using novel signal processing and statistical analysis. During his graduate school training, he had the opportunity to teach as a graduate teaching assistant in the Department of Engineering Education. This experience, as well as various teaching courses, moved Alexis’ focus from a research faculty position to a teaching faculty position. Graduating in 2016 he took a lecturer position in the Department of Engineering Education at The Ohio State University, and later in 2017 began a clinical faculty position in the Department of Biomedical Engineering in the same university where he currently serves.