Conjoint Senior Lecturer
Dr Yoshiro Okubo
Medicine & Health
School of Population Health
Dr Yoshi Okubo completed his PhD (Sports Medicine) at the University of Tsukuba, Japan in 2015. He is a Senior Postdoctoral Fellow at Neuroscience Research Australia and a Conjoint Senior Lecturer at UNSW Sydney, School of Population Health. His research interest includes falls, balance/gait, exercise, task-specific training, augmented and virtual reality. Dr Okubo has developed an innovative Trip and Slip Walkway which is a breakthrough approach for elucidating the mechanisms of trip- and slip-induced falls, effective stepping strategies and motor skill learning fundamental to effective fall prevention in older adults. His studies have demonstrated reactive stepping at the critical moment of an unexpected trip or slip can be regained in older age and people with Parkinson’s disease. This training principle has been adapted into a novel reactive balance training program ReacStep designed for clinical settings. As senior author, he led global experts in developing a consensus review article that provides guidance for researchers and clinicians interested in reactive balance training for fall prevention: “Perturbation-based balance training: Principles, mechanisms and implementation in clinical practice”.
Phone
02 9399 1065
E-mail
Location
139 Barker Street Randwick
Margarete Ainsworth Building
- Publications
- Media
- Grants
- Awards
- Research Activities
- Engagement
- Teaching and Supervision
- SafeTrip Study for a gold standard approach and mechanisms of reactive balance training to prevent falls in older adults using 3D motion capture and electromyogram (EMG).
- ReacStep Study towards accessible reactive balance training for clinical settings.
- HoloWalk Study: Next generation fall prevention program using virtual reality (VR).
- Safe Landing Study: Learning how to avoid injuries when a fall is inevitable.
- Development of a home-based step training program using an augmented reality (AR) tablet app.
- Elucidating physiological mechanisms of treadmill gait training in people living with Parkinson's disease using EMG and electroencephalogram (EEG)
- Development of a perturbation treadmill to induce obstacle-trip and surface-slip for reactive balance training in rehab and gym settings.
- Investigating the role of foot tactile sensation in the perception of slipperiness.
My Research Supervision
- Facilitation of postural reflex against trips and slips in older adults (2020 PhD)
- Comparing treadmill induced trip perturbations with overground trips: A cross-over study (2019 ILP)
- Neuromuscular mechanisms associated with successful balance recovery in people with Parkinson’s Disease (2019 ILP)
- Reactive balance responses to a trip and slip during gait in people with multiple sclerosis (2019 ILP)
- Balance Recovery Biomechanics following Slips and Trips in People with Parkinson’s Disease and Healthy Older Adults (2019 Masters)