About

I am a clinician-scientist translating core principles of mechanobiology, neurobiology and motor control to Physical Therapist practice in central PA. I maintain an active practice as a Doctor of Physical Therapy under the conviction that scientific translation must be enacted by individuals doing both clinical practice, and scientific inquiry, broadly construed. I am fundamentally interested in the cellular and computational mechanisms connecting movement and the nervous system. As a clinician-scientist, my aim is to translate these findings to clinical populations, particularly those marginalized by conventional medical and biopsychosocial diagnostic frameworks.

My training is in clinical orthopedics and bench neuroscience. I completed my bachelor's degree in 2015 as a four-year varsity letterman for the Ithaca College Bombers football team. I recieved my DPT in 2017 and shortly thereaftere completed residency and obtained board-certification in orthopedic physical therapy. My practice focused on patients with chronic neuropathic pain, usually of non-specific origin. My interest in neural mechanisms led me to a PhD investigating the physics of alpha-motoneuron discharge in fatigue and in patients with Parkinson's disease. I then completed a postdoc in a neurobiology lab studying neuromechanobiology, or the biology of mechanical stimuli on the central nervous system. While my PhD focused on how the CNS influences bodily movement, my postdoc focused on how bodily movement influenced the central nervous system. To do so, I used a suite of optical techniques, including two-photon microscopy and widefield optical imaging, to investigate how cortical neurons responded to posturally-induced changes in intracranial pressure in mice virally transfected with genetically-encoded calcium indicators. In tandem, I also investigated how postural adjustments in locomoting mice cause brain motion within the skull.

I currently lead a full-time practice in central PA, where I hold an interest in the rehabilitation of complex, system-interacting conditions. These include complex pain conditions, neurodegenerative disorders, and connective tissue disorders.

In brief, my clinical interests lie in the use of mechanistic neuroscience to understand movement, and how we might translate findings from modern neurobiology to clinical practice in a rehabilitation context. My theoretical interests include the consequences of measurement decisions in both experimental neuroscience and in clinimetric outcomes. I am particularly interested in the intersections between medicine, science and software, and have written software for scientists to analyze movement-related data and for registration of brain imaging onto 3D anatomical templates.