Research Facilities

The Department’s resources include leading-edge technology for each program.

Facilities for research include:

• Biomechanics Laboratory - is designed to investigate the mechanics of locomotion using video analysis and custom designed force sensors. A main component of work completed in the lab involves the design and construction of specialized force transducers and the development of novel analytic strategies related to the energy cost of movement.
• Biomedical Research Facility - is the center for research in Nutritional Neuroscience at FSU. Departmental faculty members with laboratories in this facility conduct research on the role of nutrients in the brain that control obesity, blood pressure, neuronal survival, and gene expression. Some current efforts focus on the cellular and molecular roles of nutrients in the brain that control obesity, blood pressure, neuronal survival, and gene expression.
• Cardiovascular Laboratory - The main interest of the Cardiovascular Laboratory is to evaluate the effects of exercise, particularly resistance exercise, and L-citrulline supplementation on autonomic control of blood pressure, central hemodynamics and arterial stiffness in individuals with chronic diseases. the laboratory uses non-invasive techniques to evaluate autonomic control (heart rate variability, BP variability and baroreflex sensitivity), vasodilatory capacity (strain gauge plethysmography), stroke volume (impedance cardiography) and arterial stiffness/aortic blood pressure (pulse wave velocity and pulse wave analysis).
• Exercise Physiology Laboratories - are for studying human performance, exercise metabolism, cardiovascular and muscle physiology. The two Exercise Physiology Laboratories are equipped for teaching and research related to the human response to exercise. The Research Lab contains computerized systems for the measurement of oxygen uptake, blood lactate and blood gas analyzers, an environmental chamber and a DEXA unit, in addition to various equipment necessary for biochemical assessments.
• Motor Skills Learning Laboratory - contains leading-edge facilities for single or multiple subject testing, large applied motor skill testing for gait and balance disturbances, chronic motor dysfunction, and kinematic analysis. The laboratory is equipped with an electronics workshop and 18 pentium class computers. The entire laboratory is networked via its own server so that across platform communication is facilitated. Undergraduate instructional labs are located in a separate facility.
• Nutrition and Food Instrument Laboratory - provides a setting for chemical, analytical, and microbiology testing and includes new and updated equipment. The laboratory complex also features a new Cold Lab that facilitates research requiring constant low temperatures.

  Some of the Instruments used in the Nutrition and Food Instrument Laboratory :

  • Sirrus clinical analyzer: employs multiple biochemical tests to measure multiple samples at one time
  • Dual Energy X-ray Aborptiometry: used for bone mineral density (BMD) and body composition studies
  • Fluorescent microscope
  • Microcomputed tomography 3D scanner for bone analysis

In addition, the University has a number of core laboratory facilities that are used by faculty and graduate students including a Peptide Synthesis and Sequencing Facility, DNA Synthesis and Sequencing Labs, Hybridoma Lab, Cell and Tissue Culture Facilities, and Laboratory Animal Facilities