From 1986 to 1989 he worked on the remote control of robot manipulators in the Man-Machine Systems Group in the Automated Systems Section of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Caltech. He supervised that group from 1988 to 1989. Since September 1989, he has been at the University of Washington in Seattle, where he has been Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering since 1993. He was awarded the National Science Foundation's Presidential Young Investigator Award and the Early Career Achievement Award from the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. His currently active interests include haptic displays on the internet, surgical biomechanics, and biologically based design of robot manipulators.
Haptic interfaces apply robotic techniques to develop better ways to interface humans and computers.
Biological movement systems have many properties which exceed those of mechanical robots. By building robotic replicas of biological systems there is a hope to engineer better robots as well as learn more about biology. Applications of this technology include remote vehicles and prosthetic limbs. Selected Publications F. Boe, B. Hannaford, 'On-line Improvement of Speed and Tracking Performance on Repetetive Paths,' IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, vol. 350-358, May 1998.