Dr Matthew Pain

  • Reader in Biomechanics

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Matthew Pain

After completing his degree in Physics with Astrophysics at Leicester University, Matt obtained an MSc in Applied Geophysics from Birmingham University. He then started in the Biomechanics Lab at Birmingham University before moving to carry on his postgraduate studies in biomechanics at Penn State University in the USA where he graduated with a PhD in 1999. Matt then started as a Lecturer at º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ in 2000.

Matt has published over 75 peer reviewed academic journal papers, supervised more than 20 PhD students to completion and has secured external income of over £1 million as PI and over £2.25 million as CI. He has also worked with over a dozen sports as a consultant and been an expert witness in major criminal cases regarding the biomechanics of injury causation and human movement.

His research has led to him being involved with dozens of television and radio programmes, including the Royal Institute Christmas Lectures and BBC's Horizon, and presenting his work at the Science Museum.

Whilst at º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ, as well as developing and teaching on a dozen different modules over the years, Matt developed the first MSc in Sports Biomechanics in the UK and ran it for five years. He was then Programme Director for the Sport and Exercise Science BSc for six years, was in charge of Education for the National Centre for Sport and Exercise Medicine East Midlands for five years, and was discipline lead for the Sports Biomechanics and Motor Control Learning and Teaching Group for five years.

Matt's sporting interests are the martial arts in which he has been training for 40+ years.

Matt's research interests are in developing a greater understanding of maximal volitional human performance during dynamic actions in sport and everyday living by studying the biomechanical, neuromuscular and neural factors that underpin such performance. The key areas he has been working on are soft tissue motion during impacts, gross human response to impacts, maximal voluntary and stimulated muscular actions and their neural control. These are all fundamental areas underlying performance and injury mechanisms in combat, contact and power-based sports, as well as being relevant to neuro-muscular performance in other dynamic events such as jumping, sprinting and weightlifting. These have led naturally to further research developing in the area of motor control, specifically timing coordination limits and the control of balance, which are essential to dynamic human movement and recently concussion.

This research utilises: 3D motion measurement of intra-limb motion and whole body movements; surface electromyography and neuromuscular stimulation; iso-velocity torque measurements of strength and power; medical imaging; force and pressure measurements from human-surface interactions; and computer simulations.

As well as being a reviewer for over 30 journals and publishers and having been on the conference and scientific committees of over a dozen international conferences, Matt has held a range of educational, editorial and grant reviewing panel positions.

Editorial

  • Associate Editor, Journal of Applied Biomechanics
  • Board of Consulting Editors, Journal of Biomechanics
  • Programme co-chair and editor, Proceedings of the 10th International Symposium on Computer Science in Sport, º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ, UK, September, 2015

Grant Reviewing

  • Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
  • Medical Research Council
  • National Science Foundation, USA
  • Finnish Research Council of Biosciences, Health and Environment
  • Academy of Finland panel member
  • Leverhulme Trust

Education

  • Contributor to The University of Western Australia’s secondary teacher’s program, SPICE
  • Contributor to CD in Edexcel A Level Science: AS Physics Students' Book, Pearson
  • Research Councils UK Science Learning Centre CPD courses

Featured publications