Alireza Abbasimoshaei is currently a postdoc researcher at the Institute for Mechatronics in Mechanics at the Hamburg University of Technology in Germany. Before joining iMEK, he designed and built four robots and controlled them. The last one was at the Technical University of Braunschweig in Germany. He filed two patents for rehabilitation devices and sold a finger rehabilitation robot to a hospital partner. He also developed a new control system for rehabilitation robots in the field of control. He was one of the Editors of the 3rd edition of “Engineering Haptic Devices.” He is an expert in mechatronic system design with special emphasis on mechanical, control, and haptic system design.
Thorsten A. Kern received his Dipl.-Ing. and Dr.-Ing. degrees from Darmstadt University of Technology (TUDA), Germany, in the fields of actuator and sensor development for medical human-machine-interfaces (HMIs) in applications like minimally invasive surgery and catheterizations. He is currently the director at Hamburg University of Technology, Germany, of the Institute for Mechatronics in Mechanics. He previously worked in Automotive Industry at Continental as an R&D manager for interior components, leading a team of 300 engineers worldwide. He joined Continental in 2008 covering various functions with the increasing range of responsibility in actuator development, motor-development, and active haptic device development before shifting toward R&D management and product management on Head-Up-Displays. Between 2006 and 2008, he was working in parallel in a startup focusing on medical interventions and was the main editor of the 1st edition of “Engineering Haptic Devices.” He joined Hamburg University in January 2019. His interests are specifically focused on all types of electromagnetic sensors and actuators and their system-integration toward larger motor- or sensor-systems in high-dynamic applications.