On any given day, Richards Hall on Northeastern University’s Boston campus is filled with the sound of students’ shuffling feet or energetic class discussions, but this week you might have heard something else: a whip cracking.

The man responsible for that distinct cracking sound is Jack Lepiarz, aka Jack the Whipper, a trained whip performer who has become famous on social media.

As part of their work on human movement control, Dagmar Sternad, university distinguished professor of biology, electrical and computer engineering and physics, and her research group at Northeastern’s Action Lab are looking at the movements of experts like Lepiarz, as well as whip cracking novices, to understand how humans manipulate complex objects, like whips.

Read more from Northeastern Global News.

Photo by Alyssa Stone/Northeastern University