University of Pittsburgh-Pittsburgh Campus · Biomedical EngineeringFood Service Footwear Safety Lab
Kurt E Beschorner · Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Research Focus
Dr. Kurt E. Beschorner's lab at the University of Pittsburgh focuses on improving safety in the food service industry, particularly by preventing slip and fall accidents through better footwear technology. The lab develops tools to help workers choose the right shoes and determine when to replace them, based on new research about shoe-floor interactions. By gathering data on how different shoes perform in various working conditions, the lab aims to enhance safety practices and ultimately reduce injuries for food service workers.
slip preventionfootwear safetywearable technologyuser-centered designfriction measurement
Research Aims
4AIM 01Identify high-risk flooring contaminants and relevant shoe types for food service workers.
AIM 02Build a comprehensive database of slip resistance performance for common footwear.
AIM 03Develop user-friendly tools for selecting appropriate non-slip shoes and tracking shoe wear.
AIM 04Evaluate the effectiveness of the new tools in real-world food service settings to reduce slip accidents.
Skills the Lab Values
shoe-floor friction testinguser-centered design methodsdatabase creationapp developmentquantitative research methods
Output against the department
Publications111bottom 21% of dept.469th of 595
this lab
most publishedleast published
Citations1.9kbottom 13% of dept.516th of 595
this lab
most citedleast cited
Career totals from OpenAlex, compared against labs that share a department. A department spans everything from one paper to tens of thousands, so bar heights are on a log scale — otherwise the largest lab would flatten every other bar to a line.