People

Sook-Lei Liew is an Associate Professor and Director of the Neural Plasticity and Neurorehabilitation Laboratory at the University of Southern California. She has joint appointments in the divisions of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy, Biokinesiology and Physical Therapy, Biomedical Engineering, Neuroscience, and Neurology, is a member of the USC Stevens Neuroimaging and Informatics Institute. She is the Chair of the ENIGMA Stroke Recovery Working Group, which aims to meta-analyze high-resolution brain imaging and behavioral outcomes in individuals after stroke from thousands of patients collected across more than 40 research cohorts from 10 countries worldwide. She also is a co-Director and co-founder of the USC SMART-VR (SensoriMotor Assessment and Rehabilitation Training) Center (smartvr.usc.edu).

After she earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in Kinesiology and English from Rice University in 2006, she went on to receive a Master of Arts in Occupational Therapy (2008) and a PhD in Occupational Science, with a Concentration in Neuroscience (2012), both from USC. She completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in neurorehabilitation and has been a visiting scholar at Peking University, the University of Tübingen, and Johns Hopkins University. 

The goal of Dr. Liew’s research is to understand mechanisms of neural plasticity in healthy individuals and individuals after neurological injury that support a person’s ability to learn new skills and recover from brain injury. Her laboratory has championed novel big data approaches to study brain imaging and behavior to understand how people recover after stroke, as well as neuromodulatory techniques and technologies such as noninvasive brain stimulation, brain computer interfaces and virtual reality to promote learning and enhance plasticity and rehabilitation after brain injury. She has over 40 peer-reviewed publications and given over 120 invited talks and conference presentations. Her work has received over $4.5 million in funding from agencies such as the NIH, National Science Foundation, US Army, and American Heart Association, has received the SXSW Special Jury Award for the Innovative Use of Virtual Reality Technology in the Field of Health, and has been featured in press outlets such as Forbes, CNET, and PC Magazine.

Octavio Marin Pardo is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Chan Division of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy. He received his PhD and MS Degrees in Biomedical Engineering from USC in 2023 and 2019, respectively. He received his BS degree in Mechatronics Engineering from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) in 2017. His research focuses on using non-invasive neuroimaging methods (e.g., magnetic resonance imaging, electroencephalography) and rehabilitation technology (e.g., human-computer interfaces, virtual reality) to understand motor recovery after stroke.

Stuti Chakraborty is a PhD student in the Occupational Science program at the USC Chan Division of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Occupational Therapy from Christian Medical College, Vellore, India in 2020. She worked as a clinical OT in the neurorehabilitation of patients with acute stroke and head injury.

Mahir Khan is a PhD student in the USC Neuroscience Graduate Program. He received his Bachelor’s Degree in Neuroscience from the University of Rochester and Masters Degree in Physiology from Georgetown University.

Lahari Muthyala is a Computer Science graduate student at the USC Viteri School of Engineering.

Amisha Kumar is a Neuroscience undergraduate student at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.

Emily Marks is an entry-level Occupational Therapy Doctoral student at the USC Chan Division of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy.

Kyle Nishimura is a Research Assistant at the USC Chan Division of Occupational Science & Occupational Therapy.

Masters in Education Athletic Administration and Student Affairs.
Bachelors in Exercise Science Education.

Bachelor’s Degree in Social Work.
IHSS caregiver.

Pablo Celnik is the Lawrence Cardinal Shehan Professor and Interim Director of the Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Department at Johns Hopkins Medicine, and the Physiatrist-in-Chief in the Johns Hopkins Hospital. He also serves as the Director of Human Brain Physiology and Stimulation Laboratory and holds secondary appointments in the Departments of Neurology and Neuroscience.

His research is focused on studying the physiological mechanisms underlying motor learning and developing interventions to enhance motor function in humans. The aim is to understand how does the central nervous system control and learn to perform new motor actions in healthy individuals and in patients with neurological conditions such as stroke. Using this knowledge, the ultimate goal is to develop strategies to enhance motor function in neurological patients.

Dr. Finley joined the faculty in Biokinesiology and Physical Therapy in the fall of 2013. Dr. Finley received his BS in Mechanical Engineering from Florida A&M University, and his MS and PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Northwestern University. After finishing his PhD, Dr. Finley completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Finley’s primary research interest is understanding how walking is controlled and adapted in both healthy individuals and in individuals with neuromotor impairments. As the director of the Locomotor Control lab, Dr. Finley incorporates techniques from engineering, neuroscience, and physiology to understand the factors that drive locomotor learning.

Emiliano Santarnecchi completed his doctoral work at the University of Siena and is currently a co-director of the Brain Investigation and Neuromodulation at the University of Siena and a Fellow at the Berenson-Allen Center for Non-Invasive Brain Stimulation, Harvard Medical School. His research interest lie in the neurophysiological basis of higher-order cognitive functioning, especially the so-called fluid-intelligence. He uses resting-state fMRI and MEG data in order to identify specific features of brain connectivity related to intelligence, and noninvasive brain stimulation to enhance cognitive performance.

Dr. Schweighofer has conducted computational studies addressing the way in which the cerebellum complements the roles of the basal ganglia and the motor cortex in eye and arm movements. He then paid particular attention to the processes by which error signals reaching the cerebellum could be useful for efficient motor learning. He has also studied how learning rules provide the bridge between system behavior and the neurochemistry of synaptic and cellular change, with a special emphasis on the role of neuromodulators.

Dr. Margetis is an Associate Professor of Clinical Occupational Therapy at the University of Southern California, and specializes in clinical neurorehabilitation and functional cognition. He practices at USC Keck Hospital and is a masters student in the USC Stevens Neuroimaging and Informatics program.

The ENIGMA Network brings together researchers in imaging genomics, to understand brain structure, function, and disease, based on brain imaging and genetic data. For more information, visit the ENIGMA website.