Vitae

Qualifications

Hardware and software startup experience built on a strong academic background. Thrives on innovation and turning unique ideas and concepts into production-ready and deployable products. Both individual contributor and multidisciplinary team leader seamlessly bridging Mechanical, Electrical, Embedded, and Computer Science. Ph.D and M.S in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University, B.S. in the same from the U of WA. Experience bringing together cutting edge academic research with grounded hands-on design and practicality. Loves Boulder and the outdoors.

Employment

See research pages for descriptions.

• • Nov 2018 -Present: PTC.

Boulder, CO

VP of Technology

• • Nov 2015 -Present: Frustum, Inc. (acquired by PTC Nov 2018)

Boulder, CO

CTO, Core Technology Lead Developer

• • June 2011-Nov 2015: Modular Robotics

Boulder, CO

Dir. Engineering, Research Engineer

• • Sept 2011-Nov 2015: Independent software consultant

Assisting companies and institutions with varied projects, most related to Additive Manufacturing and/or voxels.

• • September 2006-May 2011: Cornell Computational Synthesis Lab

Cornell University; Ithaca, NY

Ph.D. Student, Graduate Research Fellow

• • October 2008-May 2011: Cornell Team and Leadership Center

Cornell University; Ithaca, NY

\Part time teambuilding and ropes course facilitator

• • December 2008-May 2011: Cornell Outdoor Education

Cornell University; Ithaca, NY

\Part time rock climbing instructor

• • June 2006-August 2006: IKFF

University of Stuttgart; Stuttgart, Germany

Research Exchange Student

• • June 2004-June 2006: Genomation Lab

University of Washington; Seattle, WA

Microfabrication Research Engineer

• • Summer 2005: Earth Remote Sensing Group

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory; Pasadena, CA

Instrument Development Engineer and Field Technician

• • Summer 2003: Department of Atmospheric Science (NASA Space Grant Program)

University of Washington; Seattle, WA

Undergraduate Researcher

Education

• Ph.D. Mechanical Engineering, Cornell University, 2011

• M.S. Mechanical Engineering, Cornell University, 2009

• B.S. Mechanical Engineering, University of Washington, 2006

Academic Publications

• Hiller, J., "Digital Materials: Voxel Design, Rapid Assembly, Structural Properties, and Design Methods", Ph.D. Thesis, May 2011.

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H., (2014) "Dynamic Simulation of Soft Multimaterial 3D-Printed Objects", Soft Robotics Vol. 1, No. 1, pp 88-101.

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H., (2012) "Automatic Design and Manufacture of Soft Robots", IEEE Transactions on Robotics, Vol. 28, No. 2, pp. 457-466.

• Valsalam, V.K., Hiller, J., MacCurdy, R., Lipson, H., and Miikkulainen, R. (2012) "Constructing controllers for physical multilegged robots using the ENSO neuroevolution approach", Evolutionary Intelligence, Vol. 5, No. 1, 45-56.

• Hiller, J., Miller, J, Lipson, H. (2011) “Microbricks for 3D Reconfigurable Modular Microsystems", IEEE Journal of Microelectromechanical Systems, Vol. 20, No. 5, pp.1089-1097, Oct. 2011.

• Garcia, R.F.M., Hiller, J.D., Stoy, K., Lipson, H., (2011) "A Vacuum-Based Bonding Mechanism for Modular Robotics", IEEE Transactions on Robotics, 27(5): 876-890.

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H. (2010) "Tunable digital material properties for 3D voxel printers", Rapid Prototyping Journal, Vol. 16, No. 4, pp.241 - 247

• Tolley, M. T., Hiller, J., and Lipson, H. (2010) "Evolutionary Design and Assembly Planning for Stochastic Modular Robots," in Bredeche, N.,  Doncieux, S. and Mouret J.-B. (Eds.), New Horizons in Evolutionary Robotics: post-proceedings of the 2010 EvoDeRob workshop. Berlin, Germany: Springer.

• Hiller, J., and Lipson, H. (2010) "Evolving Amorphous Robots", 12th Int. Conference on Artificial Life (Alife XII), Odense, Denmark, August 2010, pp. 717-724.

• Lipton, J, Boban, M., Hiller, J., Lipson, H., (2010) "Freeform Fabrication of Stochastic and Ordered Cellular Structures", Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium (SFF '10), Austin, TX, USA.

• Garcia, R.F.M., Hiller, J., Lipson, H. (2010) "A vacuum-based bonding mechanism for modular robotics", Proc. of the ICRA Workshop on Modular Robots, State of the Art, Anchorage AK, May 2010, pp. 57-62.

• Tolley, M. T., Hiller, J., Lipson, H. (2009) "Evolutionary Design and Assembly Planning for Stochastic Modular Robots", Proc. IEEE/RSJ Int. Conf. Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), Exploring New Horizons in Evolutionary Design of Robots Workshop, Oct. 11-15 2009, St. Louis, MO, USA, pp. 73-78.

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H., (2009) "Design and analysis of digital materials for physical 3D voxel printing", Rapid Prototyping Journal, Vol. 15, No. 2, pp. 137-149.

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H. (2009) "Fully Recyclable Multi-Material Printing" Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium (SFF'09), Aug 3-5 2009, Austin, TX, USA.

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H. (2009) "Design Automation for Multi-Material Printing" Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium (SFF'09), Aug 3-5 2009, Austin, TX, USA

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H. (2009) "STL 2.0: A Proposal for a Universal Multi-Material Additive Manufacturing File Format" Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium (SFF'09), Aug 3-5 2009, Austin, TX, USA.

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H. (2009) "Rapid Manufacturing of Digital Materials" Rapid Manufacturing Conference, July 8-9 2009, Loughborough, UK

• Hiller, J., Lipson, H., (2009) "Multi Material Topological Optimization of Structures and Mechanism", Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO'09), pp. 1521-1528. 

• Hiller J., Lipson H., (2008) “Tunable Digital Material Properties for 3D Voxel Printers”, Proceedings of the 19th Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium, Austin TX, Aug 2008. Best Paper Award

• Hiller J., Lipson H., (2007) “Methods of Parallel Voxel Manipulation for 3D Digital Printing”, Proceedings of the 18th Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium, Austin TX, Aug 2007, pp. 200-211.

Academic Awards

• • NSF/SBIR Research Diversity Program Postdoc Fellowship 2011-2013 (Full salary to work at NSF-funded small business)

  • NSF Graduate Research Fellowship, 2008-2011 (Full 3 years tuition and living stipend)

  • Cornell MAE Fellowship, 2006-2007 (Full year tuition and living stipend)

  • Magna Cum Laude Graduation Honors from U of WA, 2006

  • Mary Gates Foundation Research Scholar, 2005-2006

  • U of WA Gibson-Wayland Endowed ME Scholarship, 2004-2005 (Full year tuition)

  • U of WA R.E. Grossman Endowed ME Scholarship, 2005-2006 (Full year tuition)

  • Washington NASA Space Grant Scholar, 2003-2006

  • Deans List Honors, U of WA 2003-2006

  • U of WA Undergraduate Scholar Award, 2003-2004