Robotics, rehabilitation therapy and learning from failure, with Dr. Milos Popovic

Episode Description

In this episode of Behind the Breakthrough, we sit down with Dr. Milos Popovic to hear about his transformational shift from aerospace engineering to rehabilitation research, and how it led to his invention of a medical device that delivers electrical stimulation to restore upper limb mobility to people with paralysis caused by spinal cord injury and stroke.

Originally from Belgrade, Dr. Popovic shares how he narrowly escaped Yugoslavia's brutal civil war as military soldiers banged on doors looking for conscripts. By fate, he received a call from a professor at the University of Toronto asking if he'd like to come study in Canada, and just days later he was on a flight to Toronto. That professor, Dr. Andrew Goldenberg, spearheaded the field of robotics at U of T and would become Dr. Popovic's longtime mentor, empowering him to then mentor a new generation of scientists at Toronto Rehab.

About Dr. Milos Popovic

Dr. Milos R. Popovic is an award-winning scientist, director of Toronto Rehab's research arm, KITE, and tenured professor, Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, at the University of Toronto.

After receiving an Electrical Engineer degree from the University of Belgrade, Serbia in 1990, Dr. Popovic went on to earn a PhD in mechanical engineering from the University of Toronto in 1996. He has since served as the associate scientific director and Toronto Rehab Chair in Spinal Cord Injury Research from 2001-2017 and is the co-founder and CEO of MyndTec, a medical technology company seeking to develop innovative therapies that improve and enhance the quality of life for individuals with paralysis as a result of a stroke or spinal cord injury.