Assistant Professor - Department of Mechanical, Materials and Aerospace Engineering
Anand Mishra is a tenure-track faculty member joining West Virginia University in Summer 2025. He leads the Robiotics Laboratory, which focuses on four key research themes: Biomimetic Soft Robotics (MIMESIS), Living Materials Integration for Functional Engineering (LIFE), Robotic Additive Manufacturing (RAM), and Agricultural Robotics and Technology (ART). Anand earned his Ph.D. with honors under Dr. Barbara Mazzolai at Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna and the Italian Institute of Technology, receiving the Best Ph.D. Thesis Award from the Italian National Bioengineering Group (GNB) in 2018. He then joined Dr. Robert Shepherd’s group at Cornell University for his postdoctoral research, which was supported by a Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Engineering Living Materials Institute and a Research Trainee Grant from the Center for Research on Programmable Plant Systems. His research spans 3D-printed soft robotics, biomimetics, biohybrid robotics, and digital agriculture, with a particular focus on plants and fungi as model systems for next-generation robotic design and materials. To date, he has published more than 35 peer-reviewed papers in leading journals and conferences, including Science Robotics, PNAS, and Advanced Functional Materials. His research has been featured in the NSF’s Discovery episodes and covered by major outlets including CNN, BBC, Scientific American, and Forbes. Driven by a vision of harmony between technology and nature, he continues to explore the untapped potential of the natural world, aiming to develop life-like robots that can improve human well-being and operate in hazardous environments.
Education
P.h.D, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Italy 2018
M.Tech, Indian Institute of Technology Patna, India, 2014
B.Tech, Uttar Pradesh Technical University, India, 2012