Josh is a Ph.D. student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he is studying biomedical engineering and conducting research in Prof. Paul Dayton’s Ultrasound lab. Prior to graduate school, Josh completed a B.S. in Chemical Engineering at North Carolina State University. At 17, Josh got started in diving with his father at Florida Sea Base through the Boy Scouts of America. Inspired by the underwater world and marine life, he pursued the Divemaster certification and scientific diver course at NC State University. Three years after his first certification, Josh returned to Florida Sea Base as a Divemaster to share the beauty of the reefs with young scouts visiting the camp.

Motivated to address decompression sickness in diving, Josh interned at the Duke Center for Hyperbaric Medicine and Environmental Physiology. In collaboration with Drs. Rachel Lance and Richard Moon, his primary project at Duke involved evaluating lymph nodes for bubbles after a simulated chamber dive. Josh was also involved in projects studying full-face snorkel masks, hypoxia, and alternative mixed breathing gases. This opportunity inspired him to continue pursuing a career in diving research.

Advised by Dr. Virginie Papadopoulou, Josh’s research at UNC utilizes ultrasound technology to assess vascular bubbles in divers after they have completed a dive. In collaboration with Dr. Frauke Tillmans at the Divers Alert Network, he leads a project measuring the variability of VGE in different divers after completing the same profile. This longitudinal study seeks to identify factors that could increase the risk of bubble presence and decompression sickness for individual divers. Josh has presented his findings at the Undersea and Hyperbaric Medicine Society’s Annual Scientific Conference and has published in a peer-reviewed journal.

After completing his Ph.D., Josh plans to pursue a post-doctoral position in the decompression research field. He aims to further understand how bubbles develop inside divers to cause decompression sickness. Through this, Josh hopes to generate personalized decompression guidelines and make the sport safer for all divers.