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Welcome to the Corneil Lab

The lab is headed by Dr. Brian Corneil, and is located at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada.

We study how the brain controls movement

Our lab seeks to understand how the brain transforms vision into action.  Much of our current work is motivated by the desire to understand how cortical and subcortical areas work together to move in a complex and changing world. Such an understanding is needing to appreciate how the brain changes following injury or disease, and how to design better brain therapies. 

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We're looking for PDFs and Grad Students!
 

Group Axe Throwing Sep 2023b.HEIC

Latest Publications

Evidence for an intricate relationship between express visuomotor responses, postural control and rapid step initiation in the lower limbs

  • Express visuomotor responses (EVRs) are directionally tuned bursts of muscle activity that aid the rapid initiation of a goal-directed movement. 

  • While EVRs have predominantly been studied in reaching, it is unclear whether EVRs extend to the lower extremities and if so, whether increasing the postural demands of a stepping task interfere with lower-limb EVR expression. 

  • We found that when postural demands were low, strong EVRs in the hip abductor muscle gluteus medius facilitated a rapid stepping response. Conversely, when postural demands were high, EVRs hindered a fast stepping response, as they necessitated larger, compensatory postural adjustments prior to step onset. 

  • These results help us better understand the interaction between ultra-rapid visuomotor transformations in the EVR network, the postural demands of a given stepping task, and subsequent step initiation.

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