Biography:

Dr. Stephen Coombes completed his masters and PhD degrees at The University of Florida. His PhD work was funded by the American Heart Association and focused on how emotional states influence motor planning and motor control. He completed postdoctoral work at the University of Illinois at Chicago working on NIH-funded studies which used functional brain imaging techniques to examine visuomotor control. Dr. Stephen Coombes was also supported by a National Research Service Award from NIMH to study the integration of motor and emotion brain circuits. He has published his research in journals that include Cerebral Cortex, Neuroimage, Human Brain Mapping, Journal of Neurophysiology, Psychological Science, Clinical Neurophysiology, and Emotion. Dr. Stephen Coombes is an assistant professor in the Department of Applied Physiology and Kinesiology at the University of Florida.

Research Interests:

Dr. Stephen Coombes’ research focuses on the integration between motor, pain, and emotional processes. He also examines how spatial and temporal forms of visual information differentially engage visual, motor, and memory brain circuits. His specific research aims are to determine:

• • Brain circuits that allow motor and emotional processes to influence each other
• • Functional and structural brain changes in acute and chronic musculoskeletal pain
• • Neural mechanisms for how motor, pain, and emotion circuits are integrated
• • Neural mechanisms for how spatiotemporal visual input affects grip force output