Me the Scientist

I am an anatomist, human movement scientist (specialisation in biomechanics) and specialist musculoskeletal physiotherapist with over 30 years clinical experience in the public and private healthcare sectors in Australia, the UK, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. I have a strong clinical, scientific, and teaching background in neuromusculoskeletal disorders, particularly of the spine. 

My curiosity to understand what defines healthy 'normal' came early. My first undergraduate degree [BSc double major in Anatomy & Human Biology, and Human Movement, University of Western Australia (UWA), 1992] represents my formal introduction, and the kick-off to a career in pursuit of such discovery. Since, I have taught aspects of anatomy, biomechanics, and health, to a wide variety of learners; natural therapists, yoga instructors, movement practitioners, architects & urbanists, under- & post-graduate medical and allied health professionals, and even to incarcerated prisoners! 

I've long been passionate about understanding and improving symmetry in how people move. My second undergraduate degree [BSc Physiotherapy (First Class Honours), Curtin University, 1995] exposed me to 'abnormal' as a revelation for 'normal'. My honours thesis, 'Normal and degenerative anatomy of the thoracic intervertebral discs and vertebral bodies: age and gender relationships', comprised a morphological description of the thoracic spine based on 51 hemisected complete cadaveric spines, 16 thoracic columns sectioned at the mid-disc level in the transverse plane, and 90 post-mortem spinal column radiographs. This work features in the book "Clinical Anatomy and Management on Thoracic Spine Pain" [2000, Eds LGF Giles & KP Singer].  I centre my attention on characterising 'normal', and defining the natural history of ageing 'healthy' bodies.

After a decade of clinical practise in private and public sectors in Australia and the UK, I returned to Western Australia to complete a Masters in Manual Therapy [UWA, 2006]. On return to specialist practise in the UK, I recognised that I had many unresolved questions borne from clinical instinct that may have been better understood in a move to academia. 

My PhD [University of Western Australia, 2011] involved a prospective, longitudinal study examining clinical outcomes for two years after lumbar surgery augmented with DIAM interspinous implant. In particular, my focus was to identify change to spinal curvature [surface (via rasterstereography) & skeletal (via radiography)], pain & function. My PhD thesis had eleven collateral studies including 3D kinematics and MRI analyses, and enrolled surgical patients with various spinal disorders like lumbar spinal stenosis and degenerative disc disease. The thesis PDF is included for interest below.

Since 2014 (in Switzerland), my scientific focus has been in characterising the natural history and degenerative change to muscle & tendon tissues, and particularly spinal muscles in relation to neuromusculoskeletal disorders. A specific interest is in defining advanced imaging biomarkers that distinguish symptomatic pathology from healthy ageing. I am a recognised international expert in spinal muscle morphology analysis and scholar of the healthy spine phenotype. I have a wide collaboration network, and have led or partnered studies with several international author groups. I'm a member of global MuscleMaps consortium, an international collaboration striving toward open-access standardised image analysis and dataset to characterise healthy whole body muscle tissues. I'm dedicated to understanding ageing anatomy and kinematics of the body as key to preventing many musculoskeletal conditions that burden society. Methods to improve public health remain an important driver to defining healthy ageing.

I created the concept of body urbanism and 'bodyfulness' (The Netherlands, 2018) as a response to the public health problems awaiting our ageing population. The need to build engaging and challenging public spaces that promote healthy activity behaviours for our bodies is urgent. Further details are in a separate tab.