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Expert has been at (Undisclosed) where he currently is a professor in the Department of General Engineering. Expert is also Director of the Nondestructive Testing and Evaluation Research Laboratory. The Laboratory supports research work in ultrasonics (immersion, air-coupled, and water-squirt), laser-driven-ultrasonics and interferometry, acoustic emission, acousto-ultrasonics, impact-echo, spectral analysis of surface waves, microfocus radioscopy, electromagnetics, eddy currents, and holography.

He has taught courses in structural design, machine component design, and in nondestructive testing and evaluation of materials and structures. He places special emphasis in the evaluation of damage during the complete life cycle of components. Towards that end, he emphasizes "design for inspectability" and "manufacturing process control" using acoustics (including acoustic emission), ultrasonics, acousto-ultrasonics, radiography, electromagnetic methods (including eddy currents, and magnetic particle inspection), liquid penetrant, and visual methods of inspection.

Expert has continuously taught design-related courses over the last 20 years. He has taught courses in solid mechanics, structures, plates and shells, dynamics, mechanical and structural design, CADD (Computer-Aided Design and Drafting), and Fundamentals of Nondestructive Testing and Evaluation. Over the last 20 years, the expert has guided teams of students to address industry-sponsored structural and mechanical design problems. His students were bestowed eighteen awards from the National James F. Lincoln Arc Welding Foundation Design Competition. He also established a course in nondestructive testing and evaluation to foster the integration the principles of nondestructive testing with mechanical and structural design principles.

Nondestructive testing and evaluation (NDT&E) involves analytical and computational methods as well as the use of physical principles to measure and evaluate the fitness for service of materials and structures without impairing their usefulness or serviceability. Expert has the opinion that the implementation of this technology during design, manufacturing and construction processes promotes quality, assures reliability, enhances confidence, and improves product safety. Although nondestructive testing and evaluation techniques have been traditionally used almost exclusively for detection of macroscopic defects (mostly cracks) in structural components after they have been in service, it has become increasingly evident that it is both practical and cost effective to expand the role of nondestructive evaluation to include all aspects of materials production and application and to introduce it much earlier in the manufacturing and construction cycle. Expert has developed and perfected techniques which are capable of monitoring and controlling materials production processes, manufacturing and construction processes, and the amount and rate of degradation during the materials in-service life.

Expert has developed several nondestructive testing methods including methods to evaluate adhesive bond strength at the bond-line between similar or different materials, porosity in composite materials, damage in steel-reinforced radial truck tires, material properties characterization in dimension stone cladding, and asphalt concrete. He has also used these methodologies to evaluate different materials and structures including wood composites, laminated safety glass, fiber reinforced composite materials, and steel-reinforced radial truck tires. He also developed a methodology to design asphalt concrete mixtures to maximize the contribution to noise abatement from the pavement itself.

Expert has taught courses in materials testing and experimental stress analysis for the last 14 years. His main research areas are in the development of advanced sensors, on-line process control and materials characterization, life-cycle management of materials and structures, and artificial intelligence towards application in signal analysis and imaging processing. He places special emphasis on the development and optimization of those nondestructive evaluation techniques which lend themselves to intelligent manufacturing and construction processes. Expert also has research interests in the areas of quality control inspection methods in manufacturing processing, mechanics of composite materials, design of composite structures, and design for inspectability.

In addition to appreciating the advantages of statistical quality control methods, he has the opinion that development and implementation of real-time on-line process control methods in manufacturing and construction processes improves product quality, safety, and reliability. Based upon nondestructive testing and evaluation principles, Expert has developed on-line quality control methods, including quality control for cold-heading manufacturing processes, to assure that all parts are within specified design tolerances.

Expert has reviewed manuscripts and/or proposals to many organizations, including the National Science Foundation, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.He has served as a consultant to many companies, including Sundstrand Aviation, Kraft, Chicago Extruded Metals, Eaton, and R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company. Expert has had between one and three undergraduate students often enrolled under a special projects course working at the Nondestructive Testing and Evaluation Research Laboratory under his direction. Expert founded the Float'n Illini, a team of students from different departments with a common goal of running scientific experiments in reduced gravity. He founded and advised the group for a three-year period of participation in the NASA Reduced Gravity Student Flight Opportunities Program. The students brainstorm to generate technical problems in need of solution, select the most important problems, write technical proposals that are submitted to NASA, seek funds from outside sponsors, spend two weeks at the Johnson Space Center in Houston and fly in the KC-135 plane (also called the "vomit comic"), and write technical reports, which are then submitted to NASA. In the first year, the Float'n Illini had seven students and one project accepted by NASA; during the second year, the student team had seventeen students and had two projects accepted by NASA. During the second year, the Float'n Illini team was bestowed the Pioneer Award for Education by the National Space Society. This award is one of the top Society awards given to that individual or organization that has done significant work in bringing space into the classroom and thereby spark a new generation to set its sights high. During the third year thirteen students participated in the program.