Brain Injury Modeling by Biomedical Engineering Professor Reveals Deep Trauma Patterns

Assistant professor of biomedical engineering Kaveh Laksari was first author on the paper “Mechanistic insights into human brain impact dynamics through modal analysis,” which appeared as a featured paper in the journal Physical Review Letters.

Using data gathered from 537 head impact kinematics across 31 athletes, Laksari and a team of researchers developed a computer model to characterize the outcomes of different kinds of head impacts. Their findings? Some of the most dangerous brain injuries today don’t come from hitting your head on a hard surface. In fact, sometimes they come from not hitting your head on anything. When the brain moves within the skull, different parts of the brain sometimes move at different rates. This can cause stretching and straining in the deeper regions of the brain and lead to injuries like concussions.