Jonathan Kuniholm spends his work days using sophisticated technology to develop detailed engineering designs, including mechanical models for the manufacture of prosthetic devices. Kuniholm, a PhD candidate in biomechanical engineering at Duke University, is a partner at Tackle Design Inc., in Durham, N.C., and a driving force in Tackle’s Open Prosthetics Project. Tackle and seven other Open Prosthetics participant organizations create innovative prosthetic devices and publish their designs online, so that anyone worldwide can use, customize, or improve on them.

Adding to Kuniholm’s skill and engineering expertise is a painful but enlightening reality of his own: he uses a prosthesis in place of his right hand and forearm. He was wounded in an ambush attack on his U.S. Marines Reserve patrol unit on New Year’s Day 2005 – near the Euphrates River in Iraq – that killed one of the Marines on the patrol. Kuniholm’s wounds resulted in the amputation of his right arm below the elbow.

But as a self-confessed problem-solver, Kuniholm was not about to let his injuries get the better of him. With the aid of three prosthetic devices and computers outfitted with assistive technology, including some enabled by Microsoft Windows, Kuniholm has returned to his engineering work at Tackle Design. He’s capitalizing on these assistive tools to pursue a big goal: combining his life experience with his biomechanical expertise to help improve prosthetic technologies.