Leone Costi

I am a Research Fellow in Biomimetics working in the ACT since July 2024.

I obtained my B.Sc. in Biomedical Engineering at 'Politecnico di Torino' and my M.Sc. in Bionics Engineering, with a specialization in Biorobotics, jointly at 'Scuola Superiore Sant' Anna' and 'University of Pisa'. I then obtained a Ph.D. in Bio-Inspired Robotics at the 'University of Cambridge' in October 2023. My research focused on the development of a platform for teleoperation able to reproduce remotely the sense of touch. Thanks to the implementation of fully soft robotic interfaces both for control and feedback, and the introduction of functional smart materials such as magnetorheological elastomers, I was able to propose a platform for remote palpation comparable in diagnostic accuracy to state-of-the-art, but significantly less invasive.

A detailed overview of my research can be found on Google Scholar.

My research interests lay between engineering and biology, in the middle field in which nature is taken as inspiration for technology and technology is used to investigate and explain complex biological processes. At the beginning of my education, I used to think that technology could be the answer to most limitations showcased by nature. Nine years later, I am convinced of the opposite: nature needs to be treated as a teacher and more often than not it has already found answers for complex unsolved technological problems. Here in the ACT, I focus primarily on how biological systems can offer solutions for space-related applications, and how we can artificially reproduce and control such systems.

Feel free to contact me by e-mail (tni.ase@itsoc.enoel).