Lara Boyd

Professor

PhD, University of Southern California

Department of Physical Therapy

Prof. Lara Boyd is a Neuroscientist and Physical Therapist at UBC. She has held a Canada Research Chair, a Michael Smith Foundation for Health Career Scientist award and was a Peter Wall Early Career Scholar in 2012. Dr. Boyd directs the Brain Behaviour Lab at UBC. Her TEDx talk “After this your brain will not be the same” has over 24 million views. Prof. Boyd is an expert in mapping how behaviours, environments and experiences affect brain health and learning using techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging and non-invasive brain stimulation. To date this work has largely examined the impact of exercise and learning on neurobiology.

Primary Recipient Awards

Wall Scholars, Lara Boyd, 2020

Primary Recipient Lara Boyd

Program Wall Scholars Program

As a Wall Scholar Prof. Boyd will turn her attention to developing understanding of the importance of the arts for brain health. Literature, music and art have always been highly valued by humans but their impact on neurobiology is not well understood. Yet their persistence through time and intrinsic value across all cultures demonstrate their significance. Given that arts exposure and training are often the first to be set aside when economies struggle it is critical that we understand their impact on brain health. Prof. Boyd’s goal for her time as a Wall Scholar is to build a new interdisciplinary research team that generates data explaining how the arts impact brain function, structure and excitability, and ultimately affect brain health.