Army

Far from the city streets in Iraq and Afghanistan that are today's battlefields, a Harvard scientist is working in a sterile lab in Cambridge, simulating the impact of explosions, and trying to better understand what a blast does to a soldier's brain.

As a soldier, Army Major Kit Parker served two combat tours in Afghanistan. As a cutting-edge researcher, his work in the field of traumatic brain injury is personal.

“A friend of mine was wounded with a traumatic brain injury, and he was improperly cared for by the military," Parker said. "I got upset about this, and my frustration with my friend’s care, and some ideas that I had about brain injury, and having reviewed the literature of brain injury, I decided to get into that field.”