Position 
Honorary Associate

Qualifications
MD (Aegean) PhD (UNSW)

Dr Bulent Turman is an Associate Professor at Bond University, Faculty of Health Sciences & Medicine, Queensland. 

Dr Turman is supervising school postgraduate students and is involved in School research.

Dr Turman's primary research interests are in:

Mechanisms of tactile sensation

This project involves animal-based experiments investigating information processing at different levels of the central nervous system.

Functional reorganisation of the somatosensory system following injury

This project investigates, in humans, whether perceptual changes take place that might be consistent with reorganisation within the somatosensory cortex as a consequence of spinal cord or brain injury.  Comparisons are made with non-disabled control subjects.

The effects of cutaneous afferent feedback on muscle activity in hemiplegic patients

The project investigates the extent to which cutaneous tactile information influences the motor performance in cerebrovascular accident patients. 

The details on his research are as follows:-

Neural mechanisms in tactile sensation

This project involves animal-based experiments in collaboration with Professor MJ Rowe (University of New South Wales).  Several investigations of information processing at different levels of the central nervous system in cats and primates are currently under way.

Functional reorganisation of the somatosensory system following injury 

The broad aim of this project is to investigate, in humans, whether perceptual changes take place that might be consistent with reorganisation within the somatosensory cortex as a consequence of spinal cord or brain injury, and compare these findings with non-disabled control subjects.  Specific aims and objectives of the project are as follows:

1. To measure any changes in tactile sensibility at the affected body part of patients during rehabilitation programs designed to assist recovery from injury. 
2. To investigate any changes in tactile sensibility in body parts that have cortical representations adjacent to the representation of the affected body part.  
3. To measure and compare with control subjects the tactile sensibility of patients on their unaffected ipsilateral body parts, in order to investigate the possibility that the cortical representation of the affected body part might now be processing the tactile information from the other hemisphere.
4. To establish, through psychophysical analysis, the extent to which the somatosensory system in humans is capable of undergoing plastic changes and reorganisation in response to spinal cord or brain injury.

Effects of cutaneous afferent feedback on muscle activity in hemiplegic patients 

The broad aim of the project is to investigate the extent to which cutaneous tactile information influences the motor performance in cerebrovascular accident (CVA) patients.  Specific objectives are: 

1. To assess the state of CVA patients' tactile sensibility on their affected side and compare these data with that from the unaffected side.
2. To measure the effects of cutaneous tactile inputs on the electromyographic (EMG) activity of upper limb muscles in CVA patients as they lift an object.  
3. To assess the changes in EMG activity of upper limb muscles that occur over a period of 6 months in CVA patients who receive specific tactile training and compare these with CVA patients who do not receive this training.

Titles of some of his publications are available.

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