(un)Conscious use of Sensation For Action

拿起一杯咖啡这样简单的行为需要大脑完成一系列复杂的从感觉到运动的转换。具体来说，大脑必须使用视觉信息来定位杯子，并使用视觉和本体感受信息（例如来自关节和肢体角度的信息）来定位手。然而，需要处理的信息量是巨大的，必须在处理之前减少。此外，很明显，有时人们并没有有意识地控制自己的行为（想想在棒球场上挥杆，你知道你不应该这样做）。因此，本研究项目的短期目标是：(1)研究限制有意识获取运动规划和控制所需的体感信息的机制；(2)了解意志判断在选择和优化行动视觉信息中所起的作用。对这些目标的追求将继续推动我的研究项目朝着其长期目标前进：更好地理解支持日常生活活动的准备和执行的过程和皮层基础。简而言之，神经系统如何决定使用哪些信息，忽略哪些信息，以及在做出这些决定之前，神经系统如何利用相关的输入？

The simple act of picking up a cup of coffee requires the brain to perform a complex series of sensory to motor transformations. Specifically, the brain must use visual information to locate the cup, and visual and proprioceptive information (e.g. information derived from joint and limb angles) to locate the hand. However, the volume of information necessary to be processed is immense and must be curtailed prior to processing. Further, it is clear that sometimes people are not in intentional control of their actions (consider swinging at a pitch in baseball that you know you should not). Thus, the short-term objectives of this research program are to (1) examine the mechanisms that limit conscious access to somatosensory information necessary for movement planning and control and (2) understand the role volitional judgement plays in the selection and optimization of visual information for action. Pursuit of these objectives will continue to advance my research program towards its long-term objective: to better understand the processes and cortical underpinnings supporting the preparation and execution of activities of daily living. In short, how does the nervous system decide which information to use, which information to ignore, and, pending these decisions, how the nervous system utilizes the relevant inputs? This will be examined using through 2 core paradigms -- tactile gating and sensory pre-cueing. A combination kinematic analyses and neurophysiological (TMS and EEG) will be used to characterize the behaviours and probe the underlying neural processes. In order to accomplish these objectives, a number of studies are proposed to test the following questions: 1A: Do the spatial and temporal characteristics of tactile gating change as a function of time and multi-sensory information availability? 1B:Will The magnitude of tactile gating vary with functional relevance to the task goal? 1C: Is tactile gating primarily cortical and generated by feed-forward interactions between frontal and parietal reaching networks? 2A: Do the degree and cortical basis of target encoding vary based on the availability and predictability upcoming sensory events? 2B: Can cues regarding optimal effector selection be integrated into the motor plan? These results of the proposed experiments will significantly increase our understanding of the cortical and behavioural basis for how human nervous system addresses this information barrage. Beyond this core basic understanding, these finding will have critical implications to our understanding of clinical syndromes (e.g., intention tremour, Autism) as well advanced skill performance (e.g., surgery, flight-training).