Every student project from Valero-Cuevas’ course received an invitation to present their work at the 10th World Congress of Biomechanics in Vancouver, Canada this July. (Image // Midjourney)
Humans and mice may seem worlds apart. However, according to USC Viterbi School of Engineering Dean’s professor of biomedical engineering Francisco Valero-Cuevas the differences may not be as significant as they appear.
“In terms of the bones, the muscles, your spinal cord, compared to that of a mouse, are pretty much indistinguishable,” Valero-Cuevas said. “The human brain has this extra layer on top, that came much later, and it’s specialized for cognitive. But when we talk about function and behavior, it’s the same.”
This perspective underpins Valero-Cuevas’ work in neuromechanics, a combination of neuroscience and biomechanics, the study of how the brain and body interact to produce versatile behavior. In his course, “BME 504: Neuromuscular and Bio-Robotic Systems,” students at the Alfred E. Mann Department of Biomedical Engineering translate this concept into original research, within the few weeks available for the class project.
Valero-Cuevas holds appointments in biomedical engineering and in the Division of Biokinesiology and Physical Therapy. In addition, he has courtesy appointments in the Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science, the Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering department at Viterbi.
“The most important outcome of the course is the confidence it gives them,” Valero-Cuevas said. “The premise of the course is to enable students to take the critical step from being consumers of information to creators of knowledge. They come out of the class saying, ‘You know what? I can do anything when I combine my personal passion with engineering know-how.’”
That confidence is reflected in an exceptional achievement: every student project from Valero-Cuevas’ recent BME 504 course received an invitation to present their work at the 10th World Congress of Biomechanics in Vancouver, Canada this July. An undergraduate version of the class, BME 404, is offered in alternate years with similar successes. Valero-Cuevas was recognized for this course with the 2017-2018 Northrop Grumman Excellence in Teaching Award, the highest teaching award in the Viterbi School of Engineering.
The topics of the projects come directly from the students’ personal passion in biological or medical questions, and range across topics like tennis, mouse limbs, and gerontology. Together they paint a vivid picture of what’s possible in a Viterbi classroom, especially when amazing and dedicated teaching assistants like Grace Niyo, a doctoral student in biomedical engineering, help students merge the content of the class with their personal interests: researchers engaging in new, boundary-pushing work in the field.
Using tennis backhands to understand our arm muscles
Neva Manas, Giulia Zandri, Suhail Hooker, and Nwachukwu Anene wanted to understand how neural connectivity among muscle groups changes due to injury. So they pulled from the group’s own experience pulling off backhands in tennis to find out. The team used computational models to explore how when there’s weakness in your arm muscles, the brain can rewire muscle coordination in both the injured and healthy arms simultaneously — and this rewiring can force production.
“Once certain muscles get injured in one arm, the force of those muscles in the other, intact, arm can actually be lower,” Zandri said. “Muscles across limbs are interconnected—an echo of our quadruped origins.”
This tennis-specific project could be applied to other sports where unilateral injury disproportionately affects both limbs, where this brain-body connection is also key.
“I’m a former athlete, so I’ve always thought about how to move, and how my posture influences the outcome,” Zandri said. “I never considered the neural part of it before.”
The team used a neuromuscular computational model for their study, as well as a starting with a picture of tennis star Daniil Medvedev’s backhand, chosen for how well it lent itself to their simulations. as it provided a clear reference posture for force production at the point of impact.
How mice could help us understand Parkinson’s disease
Building on the parallels between human and mouse physiology, a second team explored what mouse limbs could reveal about neurological conditions like stroke and Parkinson’s disease. With advice from Professor Lauren McElvain in the Department of Biological Sciences, students Shuting Chen, Frank Gu, Nancy Shao, and Anisa Torres used simulations of mouse limbs to investigate movement patterns associated with more demanding neural control.
By modeling reaching movements in 100 different directions in front of the mouse, the team analyzed muscle velocity behavior in simulated trajectories. Their study highlighted stark differences in muscle contractile behavior, which would require stark differences in reflex modulation by areas deep in the brain and spinal cord.
This could offer insights into how spasticity symptomatic of movement disorders such as Parkinson’s, pathologic tremor, or stroke-related conditions differentially affect the fluency of activities of daily living.
“We hope that these differences in muscle velocities in apparently similar movements could possibly be applied to physical therapy in Parkinson’s and more broadly to tremor and stroke-related movements,” Torres said. “Because of the strong similarities between mice and humans, these findings may help inform future neurological research.” The team at USC is now pursuing experiments based on those results.
Climbing towards a better future
From the lab to everyday life, Eric Kwei, John Kim, Sanskriti Gurappa, Yamato Irie, and Zijie Zhu wanted to understand how we as humans adapt to healthy aging. This third team examined how aging affects one of the most common physical challenges older adults face: climbing stairs.
They simulated 43 human leg muscles, which were selectively tested for sensitivity to various changes, most importantly in relation to strength, over several thousand simulations. “We found that, surprisingly, if only the plantar flexor muscle group loses even just 10 to 20 percent of their strength, the leg completely loses the physical capability to lift the body up the step!” Kim said.
This team hopes this study could lead to earlier and more accurate systems warning people of their physical decline, with specific attention and exercise to critical muscles, and with potential applications in preventive exercise programs, physical therapy and injury recovery. It could even help keep older adults live independently for longer.
“By catching these muscular deficits early and treating them specifically, we may help to extend the number of years older adults can live safely and actively in their own homes,” Kim said.
Get out of your chair for this research
Similarly, another team investigated a common but essential movement: standing up from a chair. Daehoon Kwon, Xiaofan Liu, Jingcheng Shi, and Yiwen Bao also focused on older adults from this study, specifically measuring how they get out of chairs. You may have seen older adults lean their upper body forward more than younger people when getting up from a sitting position. This team found out how important that adaptation actually is.
“We found that when people lean their upper body forward more while standing up, it actually reduces the effort required from the hip and knee joints,” Bao said. “This helps explain why older adults often use this “lean-forward” strategy —it’s not random, but a smart way to move when strength decreases.”
The team hopes this study could also help aging adults stay safe, independent, and mobile.
“By better understanding the biomechanical strategies older adults use during movements like sitting and standing, our work can inform the design of assistive devices, rehabilitation protocols, and fall-prevention strategies,” Shi said.
Together, these projects highlight how hands-on research at USC Viterbi is not only advancing our understanding of the human body, but also training students to provide real-world solutions that span athletics, disease, and aging, translating complex theory into practical solutions with real-world impact. Best wishes on their presentations!
These articles can be found at the website of the 10th World Congress of Biomechanics after it is held in Vancouver, Canada, in July 2026.
Published on April 27th, 2026
Last updated on April 27th, 2026