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Andrew Biewener is the Charles P. Lyman Professor of Biology in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University and Faculty Director of the Concord Field Station.  He is also a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Training and Career

Born in 1952, Biewener began his zoological studies at Duke University in the early 1970s, inspired by Steven Wainwright and Steven Vogel to pursue graduate studies in the nascent field of biomechanics. He received a Master’s (1981) and PhD (1982) from Harvard University, studying under the direction of C. Richard Taylor and Thomas A. McMahon, during which time he had the opportunity to collaborate with R. McNeill Alexander and Lance E. Lanyon.  In 1982, he joined the Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy at The University of Chicago as a faculty member, serving as Department Chair from 1995-1998. In 1998, he returned to Harvard to become the Director of the Concord Field Station and a Professor of Biology in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology (OEB), serving as OEB Department Chair from 2001-2010.  Biewener was President of the American Society of Biomechanics from 2001-2002.

Research

As a comparative biomechanist, Biewener’s research has encompassed studies of the scaling of musculoskeletal design in mammals; adaptive bone remodeling^[3,4]; the in vivo contractile function of skeletal muscles during terrestrial locomotion in birds and mammals^[5,6,7], as well as during flight in birds[^8,9,10]; and the neuromechanical control of locomotor movement^[11,12,13]. The latter has involved collaborations with biorobotic engineers^[14,15].  His research has also involved experimental validation and development of Hill-type muscle models^[16,17,18], commonly used in musculoskeletal modeling and simulations of movement to improve rehabilitation approaches of human subjects following physical injury or disease.