NCS-FO: Neural mechanisms of agency in motor control and sensorimotor learning

伸手去拿笔写字或拿工具敲钉子是每天都会产生的有意识的行为。这个项目将通过研究代理感的神经机制来促进我们对行为的有意识控制的理解-代理感是一种既打算又执行特定运动的感觉。 科学家现在能够用电刺激肌肉，以提高这种常规运动的表现。 对有些人来说，这种外部刺激的行为被认为是他们自己有意控制的结果;对另一些人来说，这种行为感觉是外部产生的，而不是他们自己的代理。 通过测量在这两种情况下的神经信号的分布和时间，与感觉到被外部控制的运动相比，被认为是故意的刺激动作，该研究将测试意识和主观经验的认知和神经理论在行为的启动和控制。这些发现可能会导致对行动神经科学的新思考方式。 它们还可以为改善机器人控制的用户系统界面和未来人类技术前沿工作的培训方法提供指导，开发新的假肢以及疾病或创伤后恢复运动功能的新康复疗法。该项目由理解神经和认知系统（NCS）的综合策略资助，这是一个由计算机和信息科学与工程（CISE），教育和人力资源（EHR），工程（ENG）和社会，行为，经济科学（SBE）。这项研究将通过功能性电刺激（FES）从外部操纵人体运动，机器人外骨骼的使用，或虚幻运动的诱导，以探索在确定时间进程和力量的代理感的必然放电和reafferent信号的作用。 一组六个实验将确定在运动学习的作用，在何种条件下，代理丢失，以及在何种程度上自愿运动可以外部修改而不失去代理感。 使用人类脑电图（EEG）和功能性磁共振成像（fMRI）测量运动系统和体感皮层中的活动和时间，将用于模拟神经反应。 当感觉到增强的运动是自发的时所采取的测量将与当运动被体验为外部引导时所采取的测量进行比较。在增强运动和被动无意识运动中的有意代理感之间的这种对比将与不同形式的外部运动增强的神经活动模式有关。 对动作的外部刺激的能动性感觉已经预测了运动学习的改善，并且与能动性相关的神经信号将用于对运动学习进行建模。 这些分析将被用来测试特定模型的机构和意识的有意行动有关传出运动线索，纹状体奖励系统和学习。了解有意识控制行为的神经机制可以为神经工程和大脑启发的设计带来新的模型，提供关于行为和学习认知控制中的个体差异和变化的新信息，该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的学术价值和更广泛的影响审查标准。

Reaching for a pen to write or a tool to hammer a nail are the kinds of intentional actions produced every day. This project will advance our understanding the conscious control of behavior by investigating the neural mechanisms that underlie the sense of agency – the feeling that one has both intended to and executed a particular movement. Scientists are now able to stimulate muscles electrically in order to enhance the performance of such routine movements. For some people, this externally stimulated action is felt to be the result of their own intentional control; for others, the action feels externally produced and not of their own agency. By measuring the distribution and timing of neural signals in these two situations of stimulated action that is felt to be intentional compared to movements that are felt to be externally controlled, the research will test cognitive and neural theories of consciousness and subjective experience in the initiation and control of behavior. The findings can lead to new ways of thinking about the neuroscience of action. They can also provide guidance for the improvement of user-system interfaces for robotic control and training methods for the future of work at the human-technology frontier, the development of new prosthetics as well as new rehabilitation therapies for the recovery of motor function following disease or trauma. This project is funded by Integrative Strategies for Understanding Neural and Cognitive Systems (NCS), a multidisciplinary program jointly supported by the Directorates for Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE), Education and Human Resources (EHR), Engineering (ENG), and Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences (SBE).The research will enhance typically controlled human motor movements by manipulating them externally through functional electrical stimulation (FES), the use of a robotic exoskeleton, or the induction of illusory motion in order to probe the role of corollary discharge and reafferent signals in determining the time course and strength of the sense of agency. A set of six experiments will identify the role of agency in motor learning, the conditions under which agency is lost, and the extent to which voluntary movements can be externally modified without losing the sense of agency. Measurements of the activity and timing in the motor system and in somatosensory cortex using human electroencephalography (EEG) and functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) will be used to model neural responses. Measurements taken when enhanced movement is felt to be self-initiated will be compared to those taken when the movement is experienced as externally guided. This contrast between a sense of intentional agency in enhanced movement and passive unintentional movement will be related to the patterns of neural activity across different forms of external movement enhancement. The sense of agency for external stimulation of action has been predictive of improved motor learning and the neural signals related to agency will be used to model motor learning. These analyses will be used to test specific models of agency and consciousness in intentional action relating efferent motor cues, the striatal reward system, and learning. Understanding the neural mechanisms of conscious control of behavior can lead to new models for neuroengineering and brain-inspired design, provide new information about individual differences and variation in cognitive control of behavior and learning, and yield new understanding of how neural processes operate in realistic and complex environments.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.