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The University of Southampton
Engineering

The human hand: biomechanical masterpiece or nightmare? Seminar

Time:
12:00
Date:
24 January 2017
Venue:
Building 07, Room 3021

Event details

Bioengineering Seminar

Abstract: Millions of people in the UK suffer from a debilitating loss of manual dexterity, which has a dramatic effect on quality of life. Biomechanical factors play a role in the progression and treatment of the conditions that cause these challenges. However, the complexity of the hand and wrist means that our understanding of these factors dramatically lags behind our understanding of the larger joints in the human body. My research group seeks to overcome this stark deficit in insight through a series of collaborations with therapists and clinicians. Our research strategy includes the creation of in vitro, in vivo and in silico tools and techniques to specifically examine the joints of the hand and wrist, allowing us to investigate their function and inter-dependency. We are quantifying the effects of surgical treatments by using repeated measures study designs in our joint motion simulator to examine changes in kinematics and kinetics that result from pathology and repair. We are validating how therapists can reliably quantify joint motion in the clinic with the objective of creating patient-specific splints for early mobilisation following surgery. We are also examining how statistical approaches may be used to quantify variation in joint shape within the population and how this may link to the development of osteoarthritis.

Speaker information

Dr Angela Kedgley , Imperial College London. Angela Kedgley is a Lecturer in Biomechanics in the Department of Bioengineering at Imperial College London. She obtained her PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Western Ontario in Canada in 2009. She then obtained a postdoctoral fellowship from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, which enabled her to work at the University of British Columbia. In 2011 she moved to the United Kingdom, working first as a Research Associate and then obtaining one of the prestigious Imperial College Research Fellowships. In 2015 she joined the department as a Lecturer. Her research interests broadly encompass the mechanics of joint motion in the human body and take an inter-disciplinary approach to developing new understanding of how we can more effectively diagnose and treat joint pathologies. Her most recent work is focussed on the hand and wrist. Angela is a Chartered Engineer, a member of the Institutes of Mechanical Engineering and Physics and Engineering in Medicine, and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

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