Samuel Nemanich, Ph.D., MSCI
Assistant Professor
Occupational Therapy
Dr. Nemanich is a human movement neuroscientist studying the brain and its control of human movement in adults and children. Dr. Nemanich completed his doctoral education in the Movement Science Program, which is part of the Program in Physical Therapy at Washington University in St. Louis. Here, Dr. Nemanich also completed a two-year NIH-supported TL1 pre-doctoral fellowship in clinical and translational science. Most recently, Dr. Nemanich completed three and a half years of postdoctoral training in the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine in the Medical School at the University of Minnesota, the last of which was supported by an NIH StrokeNet postdoctoral fellowship. Dr. Nemanich has also received grant support as Co-PI for a pilot project from the National Center of Neuromodulation for Rehabilitation (NCNM4R). During his postdoctoral training, Dr. Nemanich taught courses related to neuromotor control, non-invasive neuromodulation, and neuroscience within the Doctoral of Physical Therapy curriculum and Rehabilitation Science PhD program at the University of Minnesota.
Education
- B.S., Biomedical Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, 2010
- M.S., Clinical Investigation (MSCI), Washington University in St. Louis, 2016
- Ph.D., Movement Science, Washington University in St. Louis, 2016
- Postdoctoral Training, University of Minnesota, 2016-2020
Research Interests
Dr. Nemanich鈥檚 research surrounds understanding the neural control of movement in individuals with neurological disease and injury using behavioral (kinematics, motion analysis) and neurophysiologic (EMG, EEG, and transcranial magnetic stimulation) techniques. This research will help guide the field of neurorehabilitation. His doctoral research examined the control of gait in people with Parkinson鈥檚 disease. During his postdoctoral training, Dr. Nemanich focused on using non-invasive brain stimulation and neuroimaging to examine neuroplasticity in children with cerebral palsy and perinatal stroke. His research was also pivotal in advancing brain stimulation as a potential adjuvant rehabilitation therapy to improve motor function in this population.
In future projects, Dr. Nemanich plans to continue studying movement in typically and atypically-developing children. Specifically, he is interested in how children learn new motor skills, and how rehabilitation can be individually optimized for each child.