Multimodal Sensory Modulation and Human Motor Control

多模态感觉调制和人体运动控制

• 批准号: RGPIN-2019-04414
• 负责人: Staines, William
• 金额: $ 4.74万
• 依托单位: University of Waterloo
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2022-01-01 至 2023-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=757761
• 关键词: Multimodal; Sensory; Modulation; Human; Motor

In order to interact in our environment during everyday activities, the central nervous system (CNS) must identify and extract relevant sensory information from a vast array of concurrent inputs from many sources. Such processing is essential for accurately controlling movements, learning new motor skills leading to adaptation in the brain, and successfully relearning movement patterns following brain injury. Sensory inputs initially arrive and are processed at very distinct, modality-specific areas of the brain (cortex) before being integrated in higher-order sensory association cortical areas. Previous research has provided detailed mechanistic information regarding how sensory inputs within a specific modality are represented during movement at a relatively early cortical level. For example, our ongoing research suggests that selection of somatosensory information begins to occur at the very earliest stage of cortical processing, the primary somatosensory cortex, during sensory-guided movement and perceptual discrimination. Highly selective mechanisms appear to be involved, including inhibition of early cortical representations of task-irrelevant, unattended information, with facilitation of task-relevant, attended information. The specific regions that control this selection are unclear, however interactions between multiple brain regions including the prefrontal and parietal cortex, as well as the thalamus and cerebellum appear to play an important role. Much less is known about how these mechanisms of control are altered when the CNS is presented with multiple sources of sensory inputs, as is usually the case during natural movement. Our current work suggests that the cortical representations of competitive visual and tactile (touch) input change substantially depending on the relevance and temporal relationship between the stimuli. As such the proposed research program will focus on developing fundamental understanding of the interactions and integration of sensory inputs from multiple modalities (vision, position sense of the limbs, touch) at a cortical level and the role this plays in the acquisition and control of normal limb movement. Three themes of inquiry are proposed that include experiments to study neural mechanisms of (1) selection of relevant stimuli among multiple sensory inputs, (2) integration of relevant multimodal stimuli, and (3) experience-dependent adaptations in the brain. The themes of experiments in the research program will provide important training opportunities for several trainees, including the use of advanced human electrophysiological technologies to study sensorimotor function. The proposal will inform potential strategies that can enhance the brain's dynamic adaptations to improve motor performance in healthy individuals and strengthen rehabilitation strategies and lessen disability following brain injury.

为了在日常活动中与我们的环境相互作用，中枢神经系统（CNS）必须从来自许多来源的大量并发输入中识别和提取相关的感觉信息。这种处理对于准确控制运动、学习新的运动技能以使大脑适应以及在脑损伤后成功地重新学习运动模式至关重要。感觉输入最初到达并在大脑（皮层）的非常不同的、特定于模态的区域进行处理，然后被整合到高阶感觉关联皮层区域。以前的研究提供了详细的机制信息，关于如何在一个特定的方式内的感觉输入表示在运动过程中在一个相对早期的皮层水平。例如，我们正在进行的研究表明，在感觉引导运动和知觉辨别期间，对躯体感觉信息的选择开始发生在皮层处理的最早阶段，即初级躯体感觉皮层。高度选择性的机制似乎参与，包括抑制任务无关的，无人值守的信息，促进任务相关的，出席的信息的早期皮层代表。控制这种选择的具体区域尚不清楚，但多个大脑区域之间的相互作用，包括前额叶和顶叶皮层，以及丘脑和小脑似乎起着重要作用。当中枢神经系统受到多种来源的感觉输入时，这些控制机制是如何改变的，这在自然运动中是常见的。我们目前的工作表明，竞争性的视觉和触觉（触摸）输入的皮质表征的变化很大程度上取决于刺激之间的相关性和时间关系。因此，拟议的研究计划将侧重于发展的相互作用和整合的感觉输入从多种形式（视觉，肢体的位置感，触摸）在皮层水平和这在正常的肢体运动的获取和控制中发挥的作用的基本理解。提出了三个主题的调查，包括实验研究的神经机制（1）选择多个感官输入中的相关刺激，（2）相关的多模态刺激的整合，（3）经验依赖的适应在大脑中。研究计划中的实验主题将为几名学员提供重要的培训机会，包括使用先进的人体电生理技术来研究感觉运动功能。该提案将为潜在的策略提供信息，这些策略可以增强大脑的动态适应能力，以改善健康个体的运动表现，并加强康复策略，减少脑损伤后的残疾。