Research Description

We are interested in a broad theory of biological movement, from humans walking and running to the locomotion of small animals and the motility of single cells. Our usual approach is two fold: (1) to predict using principles of optimality or robustness (and some large-scale computation) the best possible movement pattern for a given animal and compare with experiments or data. (2) to perform novel experiments involving human and animal movement to construct empirically-based dynamical models of the observed behavior. More broadly, we are also interested in muscle physiology, mechanics, neural control, and energetics, and other questions in sensorimotor control of movement and learning in biological systems.