OUR PEOPLE
Academic Credentials
- Ph.D., Bioengineering, University of Washington, 2016
- B.S., Mechanical Engineering, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 2006
Joshua R. Buser, Ph.D., is a technical consultant at ÌÇÐĹÙÍøwith over 20 years of experience at the interface of science and engineering, with expertise including microfluidics design, prototyping, manufacturing, precision thermal control for bioassays, and hands-on design, fabrication, troubleshooting, and repair of electromechanical systems.
He's developed a particular focus on systems integration for portable diagnostic bioassay platforms and early-stage product development across life sciences and medical diagnostics.
Dr. Buser specializes in medical diagnostic device development, microfluidic system design, and manufacturing scale-up, providing expert analysis and consulting for life science companies and academic institutions. His work encompasses hardware/bioassay integration, microfluidics development and manufacturing, systems engineering for medical diagnostics platforms, and temperature control, with a particular expertise in point-of-care diagnostic platforms for low-resource settings.
Serving clients in the in vitro diagnostics (IVD) industry along with academic and clinical researchers, Dr. Buser addresses challenges including fluidic device failure modes and manufacturing scale-up of complex multilayer microfluidic assemblies. His consulting experience spans sample preparation, precision thermal management for biochemical reactions, and transitioning prototypes from early-stage to manufacturing environments.
Dr. Buser's approach integrates first-principles engineering, hands-on fabrication, computational modeling, and laboratory validation to deliver rigorous and practical solutions. He brings deep expertise in microfluidics, fluidic and thermal modeling, sample preparation, and bioassay/fluidics/electromechanical hardware integration, with his fluency across mechanical and bioengineering, systems integration, and electromechanical domains enabling cross-functional collaboration.
Before joining Exponent, Dr. Buser served as the head of a small R&D firm in Philadelphia with projects including a complete redesign of a disposable microfluidic product and development of novel non-electric heaters for isothermal amplification using exothermic reactions and phase change temperature control. Prior to that he was the VP of R&D at Chip Diagnostics, where he led development of an extracellular vesicle sample preparation system, building a pilot supply chain enabling clinical research projects led by the University of Pennsylvania. As a postdoctoral researcher and Ph.D. student at the University of Washington, he advanced the scientific understanding of partially saturated flow in porous media and created next-generation portable diagnostic systems. Dr. Buser earned his Ph.D. in Bioengineering from the University of Washington and his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Wisconsin — Madison.