Innovative People

Bernadette Murphy Proven Solver

My PhD is in Human Neurophysiology. The overall theme of my research is understanding how altered sensory input from the spine and limbs affects sensorimotor integration and motor control. Chronic postural alterations and fatigue can lead to maladaptive neural plasticity and poor movement control. I am also interested in understanding how the human central nervous system adapts in conditions such as chronic musculoskeletal pain and depression, and understanding the role of physical interventions such as spinal manipulation and exercise in aiding the re-establishment of meaningful neural connections. In order to measure altered neural function in humans, I have acquired skills in a number of non-invasive techniques which can be used to measure changes in neural processing and function in humans. This includes nerve stimulation, somatosensory evoked potential techniques (SEPs) to measure processing of sensory input by the brain, electromyography to measure electrical activity in muscles, and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), which is a technique used to investigate the output of the human motor cortex. More recently I have also begun to use magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to measure changes in muscle function and functional MRI to investigate changes in brain function with exercise.