Ben is a scientist and entrepreneur. His research is driven by fundamental improvements to methods for modeling, measuring, and estimating the behavior of a variety of physical (and often living) systems. He and his collaborators have published peer-reviewed articles, released open source software, and commercialized technology through his work with government, institutions, and private businesses.

Academic Background: Ben uses mixture theory, careful experimentation, and regression techniques as a starting point for his research and commercial innovation. Using this approach, models are derived for understanding how state variables such as temperature, pressure, concentration, and electrical potential contribute to environmental interactions, through heat, mass and momentum transfer, and shape. Custom experimental devices for measuring fiber reinforcement, intracellular pressure, strain rates, geometry, and other parameters and variables have been constructed to verify model predictions, often using regression and learning techniques. Codes for the analysis of measurement data, solutions of systems of equations, and custom software libraries and apps have been developed along the way. Successful projects include the development of chicken limbs, patterning of zebrafish embryos, metabolic regulation in hydrothermal vent worms, shape change in cannabinoid-stimulated mouse neurons and giant-celled algae, and environmental sensing by mobile and IoT devices. 

Business Background: Ben founded Sense Ai, and has developed a software library and cloud platform for aggregation and prediction of user/system and sensor data on mobile and IoT devices. He also co-founded ABV Technology, which provides machines and services for improving quality in the food and beverage industry. In 2018, he became a research fellow at Columbia University, where he is improving modeling, simulation, and experimental methods in physical mixtures. He has a PhD from Harvard in biology and a BS in mathematics and computer science from the U of M.