Janaka specializes in designing miniature optical imaging instruments for biomedical applications. He has a B.Sc. in Electronics and Telecommunications Eng. form the University of Moratuwa in Katubedda, Sri Lanka and an M.S.E (wtih Dr. Nitish Thakor) and a Ph.D. (with Dr. Arvind Pathak) in Biomedical Engineering from the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. He is currently a Kavli Neuroscience Discovery Institute Postdoc Scholar, and studies brain injury using the the instruments he developed. He is also a past Toastmaster.