Lab News
Open Streets Roxbury
In the "Open Streets" series hosted by the city of Boston, Boston neighborhoods are closed off to traffic and pedestrians can explore activities run by various community organizations! This year, we challenged families to the "box and box challenge." This clinical assessment tool is a fun way to compare hand use between hands!
Play to Thrive
Play to Thrive is an annual event hosted by the Pediatric Stroke Council from MassGeneral Hospital for Children and Young Genetic Stroke Alliance. We loved sharing some of our favorite fine motor activities are are very grateful to have spent the day with other labs and organizations supporting the CP community. It was so neat to see and try out adaptive equipment that expands access to play for all!
We are all stocked up for our summer participants!
Check out this sneak peek at a few of our snacks and prizes for an exciting new hand and brain use study! We welcome children ages 6-17 into the DEMR Lab this summer to join!
New publication!
Check out this new publication by our PhD students, lab manager, and principal investigator!
Kim, H., Kelly, M., Su, X., & Ferre, C. (2025). Transcranial direct current stimulation and motor function in children with cerebral palsy: A systematic review and meta‐analysis. Developmental Medicine & Child Neurology. doi: 10.1111/dmcn.16365.
Science on State Street
We had so much fun tabling at Framingham State University's Earth Day-themed event, Science on State Street! The theme of our table was "Grow your brain garden!" Just like gardens need water and sunlight to blossom, your brain needs rest, movement, and nutrients to grow. Visitors at our table tried out movement, sensory, and problem-solving challenges. We love talking about all of the amazing things growing brains can do!
Introducing… Participant Passports!
When children ages 6-18 visit our lab, they receive their "DEMR Research Ranger" passport! Participants earn a brain stamp on each page to mark their accomplishments at locations like "Board Game Beach" and "Block Boulevard." Each stop along the journey is explained in child-friendly language, of course!
The DEMR Lab tabled at Open Streets Allston/Brighton
At this fun community event, we got to teach about the brain, connect with other science lovers, boggle minds with optical illusions, and teach about hand dominance with the box and blocks challenge!
PhD student Evan Yarnall’s symposium talk
Evan delivered a talk titled "Bimanual skills during infancy" at the AACPDM conference!
PhD students Xiwen and Evan present poster at the American Academy for Cerebral Palsy and Developmental Medicine (AACPDM) conference
Xiwen and Evan presented a poster about one of our current studies for infants 2 to 12 months old!
New study protocol approved by IRB
The Institutional Review Board recently approved a new study protocol titled "Multimodal Characterization of Brain Organization and Hand Function in Children with Cerebral Palsy." The purpose of this research study is to understand how pathways in the brain that control the hands/arms are organized, and how these patterns relate to how children use their hands/arms when performing movements. This is especially exciting for our lab, because it expands our participant demographic to include children 6 to 18 years old!