LEARNING AND GENERALIZATION OF MULTIJOINT DYNAMICS

拟议的导师研究科学家奖旨在发展 申请人的基本研究技能，以便为独立做准备 旨在改善临床康复的调查 有运动障碍的人。申请人的学历和 研究培训如下：以下临床培训 职业治疗(B SC.)，应聘者在 生理学/神经生物学(理学硕士)神经科学(博士)。初级阶段 该计划的发起人是克劳德·盖兹博士，他是一位神经学家，曾 在电机控制领域拥有超过25年的经验。John Medige博士，一位 高级生物力学教研室和临床神经学大卫·利希特博士 教职员工也将担任导师。该计划将在 健康相关专业学院，职业治疗系， 一个卓越的、发展中的多学科研究环境。 研究计划：当前项目的目标是描述 感觉运动机制，神经系统通过它达到准确的 在伸展运动过程中控制手部运动轨迹。这部作品 基于申请人之前获得的调查结果，这些调查结果表明 本体感觉信息和特定学习的缺乏， 每个关节由另一个关节的运动产生的机械相互作用 关节会在手部路径中产生严重的不协调和扭曲。 拟议的工作提供了一种独特的方法，其中质量 前臂的分布被实验操纵以 系统地改变肘部这些相互作用的幅度。在……里面 通过这种方式，我们将探索交互力矩是如何学习的，以及如何 学习是由神经系统代表的。具体来说，这项研究 将考察肢体相互作用扭矩的学习程度 概括了不同的任务参数、肌肉的性质 用于适应新的交互扭矩的策略，以及 在这一改编中，不同类型的反馈。我们希望通过这一点 研究，以确定使用听觉替代的可行性 运动觉输入在残疾人康复中的应用 由于感觉丧失而导致的协调。

The proposed mentored research scientist award aims to develop the applicant's basic research skills in order to prepare for independent investigations directed toward improving clinical rehabilitation for individuals with movement impairments. The applicant's academic and research training are as follows: following clinical training in Occupational Therapy (B Sc.), the candidate received advanced degrees in Physiology/Neurobiology (M.Sc.) and in Neuroscience (Ph.D.). The primary sponsor for this plan is Dr. Claude Ghez, a neuroscientist who has worked in the field of motor control for over 25 years. Dr. John Medige, a senior biomechanics faculty, and Dr. David Lichter, a clinical neurology faculty will also serve as mentors. The plan will be carried out at the School of Health Related Professions, department of Occupational Therapy, an outstanding and developing multidisciplinary research environment. RESEARCH PLAN: The goal of the current project is to characterize the sensorimotor mechanisms through which the nervous system achieves accurate control over hand trajectories during reaching movements. This work builds on previous findings obtained by the applicant which showed that in the absence of proprioceptive information and specific learning, mechanical interactions generated at each joint by the motions at other joints produce profound incoordination and distortions in the hand path. The proposed work provides a unique approach in which the mass distribution of the forearm is experimentally manipulated to systematically vary the amplitude of these interactions at the elbow. In this way, we will explore how interaction torques are learned and how this learning is represented by the nervous system. Specifically, the research will examine the degree to which the learning of limb interaction torques generalizes across different task parameters, the nature of muscle strategies used to adapt to novel interaction torques, and the roles of different types of feedback in this adaptation. We hope, through this study, to establish the feasibility of using auditory substitution of kinesthetic input in the rehabilitation of patients with impaired coordination due to sensory loss.