Although there are many different causes of neck pain, the muscles on the front of the neck, the anterior cervical muscles, can play an important role in recovery.
However not much is known about the function of these muscles, which makes it difficult to know whether treatments and rehabilitation that target this muscle group are effective.
Knowing more about these muscles might therefore help some people suffering from neck pain.
In particular, we need to understand how each of these anterior neck muscles is 'built' for its particular job.
Are these muscles best suited for slow steady work such as maintaining posture or are they better for short bursts of activity? Fortunately, we can apply modern techniques to specimens from body donors to answer these questions.
Preliminary results are already suggesting that these muscles may not function in the way that anatomists and physiotherapists have previously thought.
Results of this study by Dr Jon Cornwall and Prof Mark Stringer of the Department of Anatomy and Structural Biology are due to be presented at a meeting of the European Association of Clinical Anatomists in Italy in June 2011.
The research is being funded by a research grant from the Dean's Research Advisory Committee from the Otago School of Medical Sciences.