Control of Reaching by Remapping Visual Space Maps in the Frontal Eye Field

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When a player reaches for and hits a tennis ball, the player makes coordinated eye and hand movements to hit the ball accurately and subsequently visualize the outcome of the reaching action. We examined the neuronal activity in the periarcuate cortex of monkeys while using their eyes only, one hand only, or eyes and one hand together to reach for a target. Divisions of the periarcuate cortex play differential roles in the initiation and execution of reaching by the different effectors. In particular, the deep cortical region contained neurons that were invariantly active before and during reaching execution or during self-monitoring of the reaching movements regardless of whether the eyes, a hand, or both were used for reaching. The properties of the neuronal activities suggest that the periarcuate cortex orchestrates reaching movements from start to finish, thus serving as mission control for reaching behavior using any effector.