Christopher Bender is a highly skilled research engineer with extensive experience in machine learning, computer vision, and signal processing. Currently serving as a Staff CV Research Engineer at BlackSky since April 2023, Christopher has made significant advancements in detection and segmentation models. Prior to this role, Christopher spent nearly a decade at The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, where responsibilities included leading teams in the development of efficient ETL pipelines and utilizing advanced machine learning methods. As a graduate research assistant at the University of North Carolina, Christopher was involved in pioneering research in deep learning, resulting in multiple publications in top conferences. Christopher holds a PhD in Computer Science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as well as master's degrees in Electrical Engineering from Johns Hopkins and Mechanical Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin.