Jillian received her PhD in Biomedical/Medical at the Virginia Tech-Wake Forest University School of Biomedical Engineering and Sciences in June of 2015.  Her graduate research was primarily in understanding brain injury mechanisms.   Since earning her PhD, she has been a Research Assistant Professor at Wake Forest Baptist Health working with Joel Stitzel, PhD and   Joseph Maldjian, M.D. of the Virginia Tech-Wake Forest University Center for Injury Biomechanics Childress Institute for Pediatric Trauma, National Institutes of Health/NINDS.  Their focus is on the Kinematic Impact Data Set/iTAKL Study.

Jillian is also working on Biomechanical Basis for Pediatric mTBI Due to Sports Related Concussions, with Stefan Duma, PhD, Richard Greenwald, PhD through the Bioengineering Research Partnership: Simbex, LLC, Virginia Tech - Wake Forest University, Brown University National Institutes of Health/NINDS.