Movement
Every movement starts in your brain. It is the nerve cells in the brain’s motor system that tell your muscles to get your body moving
Movement starts in the brain. Our ability to move is crucial for the survival of every animal, including humans. The parts of the brain and spinal cord that control movement are called the motor system. A fundamental goal of neuroscience is to understand how the motor system controls when and how we move. Achieving this goal is also vital for understanding what goes wrong in the various diseases and conditions that affect normal movement.
Explainer: How we move
In this short explainer, we delve into the brain’s motor system and explain how it controls movement
The Brain Prize 2022
Since 2011, the Lundbeck Foundation has awarded The Brain Prize, which is the world's largest prize in brain research. This award, amounting to 10 million DKK (€ 1.3 million), is presented to researchers who have made ground breaking contributions to neuroscience.
In 2022, The Brain Prize was awarded for research that has revolutionised our understanding of how the motor system controls movement - 'The Circuits for Movement'.
The Brain Prize was awarded to:
- Silvia Arber, Professor in Neurobiology at Biozentrum - University of Basel and Senior Investigator at the Friedrich Miescher Institutet in Basel, Switzerland.
- Martin Goulding, Professor and Departmental Head, Molecular Neurobiology Laboratory, The Salk Institute, La Jolla, CA, USA. Adjunct Professor, University of California, San Diego (UCSD), La Jolla, CA, USA.
- Ole Kiehn, Professor in Integrative Neuroscience at the Department of Neuroscience, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Professor in Neurophysiology at the Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet, Sweden.
Click here to read more and watch the films about the three award recipients and their groundbreaking research in 'The Circuts for Movement':
