Changes in high-frequency neural inputs to muscles during movement cancellation

Zicher, Blanka ; Avrillon, Simon ; Ibáñez, Jaime (Universidad de Zaragoza) ; Farina, Dario

Resumen: Objective. Cortical beta (13–30 Hz) and gamma (30–60 Hz) oscillations are prominent in the motor cortex and are known to be transmitted to the muscles despite their limited direct impact on force modulation. However, we currently lack fundamental knowledge about the saliency of these oscillations at spinal level. Here, we developed an experimental approach to examine the modulations in high-frequency inputs to motoneurons under different motor states while maintaining a stable force, thus constraining behaviour. Approach. Specifically, we acquired brain and muscle activity during a ‘GO’/’NO-GO’ task. In this experiment, the effector muscle for the task (tibialis anterior) was kept tonically active during the trials, while participants (N = 12) reacted to sequences of auditory stimuli by either keeping the contraction unaltered (‘NO-GO’ trials), or by quickly performing a ballistic contraction (‘GO’ trials). Motor unit (MU) firing activity was extracted from high-density surface and intramuscular electromyographic signals, and the changes in its spectral contents in the ‘NO-GO’ trials were analysed. Main results. We observed an increase in beta and low-gamma (30–45 Hz) activity after the ‘NO-GO’ cue in the MU population activity. These results were in line with the brain activity changes measured with electroencephalography. These increases in power occur without relevant alterations in force, as behaviour was restricted to a stable force contraction. Significance. We show that modulations in motor cortical beta and gamma rhythms are also present in muscles when subjects cancel a prepared ballistic action while holding a stable contraction in a ‘GO’/’NO-GO’ task. This occurs while force levels produced by the task effector muscle remain largely unaltered. Our results suggest that muscle recordings are informative also about motor states that are not force-control signals. This opens up new potential use cases of peripheral neural interfaces.

Idioma: Inglés

DOI: 10.1088/1741-2552/ad8835

Año: 2024

Publicado en: Journal of Neural Engineering 21, 5 (2024), 056039 [12 pp.]
ISSN: 1741-2560

Factor impacto JCR: 3.8 (2024)

Categ. JCR: NEUROSCIENCES rank: 95 / 314 = 0.303 (2024) - Q2 - T1
Categ. JCR: ENGINEERING, BIOMEDICAL rank: 48 / 124 = 0.387 (2024) - Q2 - T2

Factor impacto CITESCORE: 7.8 - Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience (Q2) - Biomedical Engineering (Q2)

Factor impacto SCIMAGO: 1.127 - Biomedical Engineering (Q1) - Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience (Q2)

Financiación: info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/HORIZON EUROPE/101077693/EU/Extracting the Human Motor Null Space from Muscles - A new framework to measure human neural activity/ECHOES
Financiación: info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/810346/EU/Natural Integration of Bionic Limbs via Spinal Interfacing/Natural BionicS
Financiación: info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/899626/EU/NIMA: Non-invasive Interface for Movement Augmentation/NIMA
Financiación: info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/ES/MICINN/RYC2021-031905-I

Tipo y forma: Article (Published version)

Área (Departamento): Área Teoría Señal y Comunicac. (Dpto. Ingeniería Electrón.Com.)