Rate My Professor Ferdinando Rodriguez y Baena

Ferdinando Rodriguez y Baena is Professor of Medical Robotics in the Department of Mechanical Engineering within the Faculty of Engineering at Imperial College London. He leads the Mechatronics in Medicine Laboratory, which develops robotic and mechatronic surgical systems, and heads the Applied Mechanics Division. Appointed Engineering Co-Director of the Hamlyn Centre for Robotic Surgery in July 2020—a role he held on an interim basis from August 2019—he contributes to the Institute of Global Health Innovation. He also serves as Mechanical Engineering Postgraduate Tutor, co-chairs the department's Equality, Diversity and Departmental Culture Committee, and is a founding member and Speaker of the Imperial College Robotics Forum. Rodriguez y Baena holds a First Class Honours degree in Mechatronics and Manufacturing Systems Engineering from King's College London and a PhD from Imperial College London.

His research specializes in applying mechatronic systems to medicine, with emphasis on clinical training, diagnostics, and surgical interventions, spanning blue-skies research to near-market translational developments. Leading a team of over 20 staff and PhD students, he has published more than 160 papers, amassing over 7,300 citations and an h-index of 45. Key publications include 'Soft Tissue Phantoms for Realistic Needle Insertion' (Annals of Biomedical Engineering, 2016), 'Method to Reduce Target Motion Through Needle–Tissue Interaction' (IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, 2015), 'Augmented Reality in Robotic Assisted Orthopaedic Surgery' (Journal of Arthroplasty, 2021), and 'Biologically Inspired Surgical Needle Steering' (Robotics, 2020). He has secured in excess of £12 million in research funding, coordinating the €8.3 million EDEN2020 European project on robotic-assisted neurosurgical drug delivery. Awards include the Leverhulme Prize in engineering, a European Research Council grant, and Imperial College President's Awards for Excellence in Leadership and Outstanding Research Team in 2020. He chairs programme committees for the International Society for Computer Assisted Orthopaedic Surgery (CAOS International), CAOS UK, and the Hamlyn Symposium on Medical Robotics, and founded the chair position for the IET’s Communities Committee for Technical Networks.