Jan. 11
Cooper Set for WALS Talk
The NIH Director’s Wednesday Afternoon Lecture Series (WALS) kicks off 2023 by hosting Dr. Rory Cooper of the University of Pittsburgh on Jan. 11 at 2 p.m. in Lipsett Amphitheater. It will be videocast at https://videocast.nih.gov/watch=46052.
Cooper’s lecture is “The Power of Assistive Technology to Transform Lives.” He is founding director of the Human Engineering Research Laboratories, a Department of Veterans Affairs Rehabilitation Research and Development Center of Excellence in partnership with Pitt. Cooper also serves as co-director of the National Science Foundation’s Quality of Life Technology Engineering Research Center, a joint Pitt-Carnegie Mellon University venture.
He has authored or co-authored more than 250 peer-reviewed journal publications and two books, including the award-winning “Care of the Combat Amputee.” Cooper is an avid wheelchair athlete and past world/national record holder at various distances in wheelchair racing.
He will present on technologies and research that he and members of the team at the Human Engineering Research Laboratories are working on ranging from apps, cushions, homes, robots and wheelchairs.
He will also speak about innovative education programs to build research and development capacity among people with disabilities and veterans.
Colleagues—particularly NIH’s trainee population—are encouraged to subscribe to the WALS listserv at: https://bit.ly/3vkfOTj.
Also, speaker nominations for the 2023–2024 WALS season are open until Monday, Jan. 16. More information about nominating a speaker can be found at: https://bit.ly/3C4jIn8.