Dustin Pieper was born in Troy, MO in 1991. After obtaining a B.S. in Electrical Engineering in 2009 from the Missouri University of Science and Technology, he went on to pursue his M.S. in Electrical Engineering at the same university. During his M.S. degree, Dustin worked as a graduate research assistant under Dr. Donnell in the Applied Microwave Non-Destructive Testing Lab. During this time, Dustin researched possible applications of frequency selective surfaces as structural health monitoring sensors. Additional research included the investigation of microwave thermography techniques for embedded rebar corrosion detection.