Robert D. Collier is an Adjunct Professor of Engineering at the Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College, in Hanover, New Hampshire. He teaches courses in acoustics and environmental engineering and is presently conducting research in hearing protection and enhancement. He has extensive experience in dynamic characterization of materials and structures and, between 1990 and 1992, when teaching at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, he worked with Steve Baum of Traverse City, Michigan in the development and testing of the Baum AAA Pro professional wood composite baseball bat. This durable bat replicates the dynamic properties and field performance of a professional wood bat and is approved by Major League Baseball for play in instructional and minor leagues. Collier reported on this work in a paper published in 1992 in which he also compared the acoustical signatures of wood bats, - the 'crack of the bat'-, and metal bats with their loud, resonant 'ping'.

As a consultant to Major League Baseball, Collier played a leading role in the establishment of The Baseball Research Center at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell under the direction of Professor James Sherwood. There he has continued to pursue his interest in how players use sound to complement other senses in playing the game. Collier was a senior staff member of Bolt Beranek and Newman, Inc, in Cambridge, MA prior to his appointment at Tufts and is a Fellow of The Acoustical Society of America.