My research focusses on the neural control of action in health and disease, particularly related to gait and balance. The goal of much of my work is to understand how and why people, for example elderly or neurologically-diseased adults, lose their balance and fall over. To this end, I use 3D motion-capture technology, inertial measurement units (IMUs), force plates, electromyography (EMG), eye trackers and sensory stimulation (including galvanic vestibular stimulation [GVS], tendon vibration, visual occlusion spectacles [PLATO]) amongst other techniques to quantify movement and delineate the underlying neural processes that contribute to motor behaviour. Patient groups of interest include cerebellar ataxia (spino-cerebellar ataxia type-6), Parkinson’s disease, progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), Alzheimer’s disease, posterior cortical atrophy (PCA), stroke, normal pressure hydrocephalus, Chiari malformation, primary mitochondrial myopathy, persistent postural-perceptual dizziness (PPPD) and healthy aged individuals.

I am a Research Fellow at the UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology (UCL IoN) where I work between the Hydrocephalus research team (Department of Brain Repair and Rehabilitation), Centre for Vestibular & Behavioural Neurosciences (Department of Clinical and Movement Neurosciences), UCL Dementia Research Centre and clinical teams at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery (NHNN).

Current projects include understanding the relationship between movement/posture and intracranial pressure, the influence of vision and proprioception on upper limb reaching in dementia and the sensorimotor integration of touch for the control of standing balance.

I obtained a BSc in Sport & Exercise Sciences from University of Birmingham, where I researched the effect of ageing on the vestibular control of balance under the supervision of Dr Raymond F. Reynolds, and a PhD in Motor Neuroscience from UCL, where I studied the control and coordination of human stepping in health and cerebellar disease under the supervision of Professor Brian L. Day.