Assistant Professor Jennifer Collinger is part of a Pitt team whose research led to the creation of a brain-controlled robotic arm, one that enabled a quadriplegic man to "feel" and remotely move his own hand—even individual fingers—for the first time since he was paralyzed more than a decade ago.
In the interview below, she discusses how animal research has shaped her work and helped advance technologies for people with paralysis.
Q: How has your work benefited from animal research?
Collinger: Without it, I don't think this kind of research would be happening now. There's no other way to know this much about how the brain controls movement using non-invasive methods in humans, so it's been using this implant technologies that's really told us how the brain works.
We might not even have gotten to the point of testing prosthetic control in people had we not done this in monkeys.
Researchers observed activity in the motor cortex not only when a monkey moved, but also when it watched someone else move. That got people thinking, "Somebody with paralysis may still be able to activate their motor cortex, even though its connection to the body has been disrupted by a spinal cord injury."
Q: What would you say to somebody who opposes animal research?
Collinger: It's important to understand that people doing this research are motivated to learn basic principles about how the body works. Often, that motivation is guided by a desire to improve medical therapies, treatments or technologies.
Much of what we know would not be possible without animal research.
