My research is focsued on enabling lifelong active living and healthy ageing through optimising neuro-musculoskeletal health. Specifically, my programme of research involves understanding the mechanisms of movement dysfunction and the development and validation of new technologies for research and clinical assessments. This research encompasses musculoskeletal to neurological diseases and various contexts including sports, occupational readiness, including astronauts in space and military personnel, and healthy ageing.
I have a particualr in interest and expertise in biomechanics of the shoulder and upper limb where I have developed and validated methods for measuring scapular and upper limb kinematics. These have been applied to understanding the biomechanical function of shoulder and neck pain, upper limb function following stroke, through to sports performance such as hand-cycling and swimming.
In recent years, there have been significant developments in lightwave technologies enabling wide exploitation of optical phase, as exemplified in particular by the dawn of Coherent Optical Communications - the key enabler for the growth in the capacity of the Internet. This is due to many key breakthroughs in laser technology (low-noise low-cost and compact lasers), new revolutionary concepts that have recently been introduced (e.g., the Optical Frequency Comb, the significance of which was demonstrated by the award of a Nobel Prize in 2005), and significant advances in electronics that, thanks to the increased speeds now possible, can accommodate the processing of very complicated coherent (amplitude + phase) signals.
Another exciting field is Hollow Core Optical fibres, which guides ligth in a central hole surrounded by a microstructure that prevents light escaping from the core. Although known for over 20 years, only very recently their fabrication enabled them to use their full potential.
