Michael Ishida

My name is Michael Ishida! I'm a postdoctoral researcher Empa (the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology) in the Laboratory of Sustainability Robotics.

Previously, I was:

• a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Cambridge (2023-2026) in the Bio-Inspired Robotics Lab and a PDRA affiliated with Gonville & Caius College.

• a graduate student at UC San Diego (2016-2022) in the Bioinspired Robotics and Design Lab and a National Defense Science and Engineering (NDSEG) Fellow sponsored by the Office of Naval Research. 

My research focuses on bioinspired locomotion of robots inspired by aquatic animals like fish and sea stars. I believe that carefully considering how we design bioinspired and paleoinspired robots will allow us to make conclusions about our natural world in ways that would be exceedingly difficult without the use of robots. 

Furthermore, I believe that non-traditional robotics techniques informed by biology will help us with the challenge of operating in a variety of environments and that we have not yet unleashed the full power of soft and bioinspired robotics in a practical sense.

For more information on: 

• my postdoctoral and M.S./Ph.D. research, please visit the Research tab

• other projects, including undergraduate work, please visit the Projects tab

• other non-academic interests, please visit the Personal tab