Neel Mehta
Andrew Merkle, a 16-year veteran of the Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory, has been named mission area executive for research and exploratory development at APL.
He began his career at APL as an engineer within the technical services department and later moved to the national security department, where he helped establish the lab’s Biomechanics and Injury Mitigation Systems program, APL said Wednesday.
As BIMS program manager, he led a team of technical professionals who worked on human surrogate systems, blast and ballistics research, occupant protection systems testing, novel high-rate sensor technologies and imaging applications.
Merkle previously held the role of RED program area manager and supervised direct-funded efforts as well as implemented an independent research and development process within the department.
He also currently serves a member of the APL principal professional staff.
RED develops technologies and services for APL sponsors such as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, National Institutes of Health, Office of Naval Research, Air Force Research Laboratory and the intelligence community.
