iCAMP: The Interdisciplinary Consortium for Advanced Motion Performance

iCAMP is an interdisciplinary research & development collaboration led by Bijan Najafi, PhD, between a host of productive, exciting, creative teams– from Podiatric & Vascular Surgery, Orthopedics, Nursing, Geriatrics, Anthropology and Engineering. This is a novel collaboration between our teams at the University of Southern California and Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.

Co-founded by Professors Najafi and Armstrong, iCAMP brings together a core team of clinicians, research scientists and biomedical engineers along with dedicated resources/infrastructure. The team shares a common vision to advance objective, innovative and practical interventions coupled with outcomes evaluation using human motion assessment in many unique areas of clinical medicine. These include:

• Biomechanics and Motion
• Frailty
• Osteoarthritis
• Cardiovascular Disorders
• Diabetes
• Chronic Pain
• Sports Injury
• Neurodegenerative Disorders
• Wound Healing & Tissue Regeneration
• Musculoskeletal Disorders
• Rehabilitation

Our research involves bio-instrumentation based on advanced wired or wireless capabilities for characterizing human motion performance in activities of daily living especially in patient’s natural environment where they are most comfortable and active. Using body worn sensors (or wearable sensor technologies) along with ancillary technologies such as virtual reality, thermal imaging, and artificial intelligence, our team employs smart signal processing to identify physical activity patterns, spatio-temporal parameters of gait, balance, and three dimensional joint kinematics and kinetics.  Our team has developed and validated several novel metrics to define disease state, assess motor learning and determine biomechanical variabilities by extracting most relevant information from human motion.

iCAMP aims to enhance patient care as well as function, mobility and quality of life through increased emphasis on screening, diagnosis and prevention using simple and robust tools for human motion assessment. In addition to our local research initiatives, we partner with a host of businesses, analysts, and research teams worldwide to foster advances in the field of motion performance.