Nicholas Stergiou

Dr. Nicholas Stergiou is an eminent researcher, professor, and author at University of Nebraska at Omaha, famous for his work in the fields of Biomechanics, Robotics.^[1][2] He currently serves as Director of the Biomechanics Research Building, the Center for Research in Human Movement Variability, and Nebraska Biomechanics Core Facility at University of Nebraska at Omaha.^[3]

Academic Appointments

Dr. Stergiou is currently a professor of biomechanics, nonlinear analysis, and motor control, learning, and development at the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO) and the University of Nebraska Medical Center. He has maintained a long career in the study of human movement, working as a graduate assistant while pursuing his Masters of Science at UNO from 1989 to 1991, after which he moved on to the University of Oregon, working again as a graduate assistant and then an instructor in the Service Physical Education Program from 1991 to 1996. In 1996, he returned to Omaha to take up first an assistant professor and then an associate professor position with UNO’s Health, Physical Education, and Recreation department, gaining full professorship in 2005.

Between his appointment in 1996 and the opening of UNO’s biomechanics building in August 2013, he also held several more important positions within the University of Nebraska system, including the graduate program chair for the Department of Environmental, Agricultural, and Occupational Health Services at the University of Nebraska Medical Center from 2007 to 2012, the Exercise Science doctoral program chair at UNO from 2011 to 2014, and was the Coordinator of Research and Creative Activity for UNO’s College of Education from 2010 to 2014.

Stergiou was also the Chief Scientific Consultant for the Orthopaedic and Sports Center of Ioannina in Ioannina, Greece, from 2000 to 2011.

From 2008 to 2014, Stergiou was the director of UNO’s Center for Research in Biomechanics. During these years, the department made due with small, cramped space available to them, until Stergiou was able to procure a 6.1 million dollar private donation, along with a ten million dollar research grant, to go forward with construction of the university’s Biomechanics Research Building, one of the world’s first buildings dedicated solely to the study of how the human body moves.^[4] Stergiou was named Director once the building opened its doors in August 2013.

Professional Accomplishments

Dr. Nicholas Stergiou is known for being a passionate proponent of biomechanics research ^[5] In addition to procuring the grant that led to the Biomechanics Research Building, Stergiou also received the largest research grant in the history of the University of Nebraska at Omaha. This also makes him the first UNO faculty to ever obtain enough private funding to construct an entirely new building for his discipline.

Stergiou has mentored dozens of undergraduate and graduate students, doctoral candidates, and post-doctoral fellows in fields related to human movement variability. He is responsible for fourteen inventions in biomechanics, including the development of a concussion development platform in 2016.^[6] He is the author of Innovative Analyses of Human Movement and Nonlinear Analysis for Human Movement Variability,^[7] and has published over 200 peer-reviewed articles.^[8]

As an international authority of Nonlinear Dynamics in Biomechanics, Stergiou has spoken at workshops all over the world. His reputation has attracted an international array of physicians and clinicians to attend the Nonlinear Analysis Workshop in Omaha, and the Biomechanics Research Building staff has hosted experts from Norway, Japan, Russia, France, and more.

Dr. Stergiou has also been rewarded with numerous awards and honors from the universities at which he has been employed, the American Society of Biomechanics, and the National Institute of Health.

References