Influence of altered sensory input and Cortical Asymmetry on Movement Induced Plasticity

人类的大脑有一种惊人的能力，可以根据运动来调整它的输出，我们称之为“神经可塑性”。运动诱导的可塑性改变了大脑的功能，通常这是积极的，并导致改善性能;但有时它会出错。它不是自适应和增强功能，实际上是适应不良，导致错误的运动模式，降低速度和准确性的性能，并创造潜在的伤害。在职业和娱乐环境中，我们经常学习新的运动技能，同时存在振动（在装配线上，或使用电动工具）或疼痛（由于运动损伤或职业过度使用）等感觉。我的研究的一个方面是解决这些感官刺激如何影响运动诱导的可塑性是适应性还是适应不良。同样，技术的进步正在改变我们使用双手的方式，越来越需要平等地使用双手。为了确保技术设计和使用导致适应性可塑性，关键是要了解我们大脑的不同侧面如何专门执行不同的任务，以及这如何影响适应性或适应不良可塑性的潜力，以响应学习新的运动，以便技术可以被设计为提高运动性能和生产力，而不是导致伤害。我的研究重点是了解皮质不对称对神经可塑性的影响，以及了解我们的大脑是否专门用于不同类型的任务。我还研究了在运动训练过程中，感觉和运动处理任务不直接产生的感觉输入的作用，以及这如何影响我们的适应性或适应不良的神经可塑性。为此，我使用经颅磁刺激（TMS）来研究大脑运动区输出的变化，并使用体感诱发电位（SEP）来研究大脑对传入感觉信号的处理。了解不对称性在运动皮层控制中的作用以及运动过程中的感觉中断如何影响可塑性，以确保技术进步导致适应性可塑性而不是适应不良可塑性，这一点至关重要。这将提供重要的知识，影响娱乐和职业活动的技术设计，帮助保护我们依赖技术的世界中加拿大人的健康和生产力。

The human brain has an amazing ability to adapt its output in response to movement and we call this “neuroplasticity.” Movement-induced plasticity modifies function of the brain and usually this is positive, and leads to improved performance; but sometimes it goes wrong. Instead of being adaptive and enhancing function, it is actually maladaptive leading to faulty movement patterns, decreasing the speed and accuracy of performance, and creating the potential for injury. In occupational and recreational contexts, we are often learning new motor skills while sensations such as vibration (on an assembly line, or using power tools) or pain (due to sporting injury or occupational overuse) are present. One aspect of my research addresses how these sensory stimuli influence whether movement induced plasticity is adaptive or maladaptive. Equally, advances in technology are changing how we use our hands, increasingly requiring equal use of both hands. In order to ensure that technology design and use leads to adaptive plasticity it is critical to understand how the different sides of our brain are specialized to perform different tasks and how this influences the potential for adaptive or maladaptive plasticity in response to learning new movements, so that technology can be designed to improve movement performance and productivity, rather than leading to injury. My research focuses on understanding the influence of cortical asymmetry on the capacity for neural plasticity and understanding whether our brains are specialized for different types of tasks. I also study the role of sensory inputs not directly generated by the task on sensory and motor processing during motor training and how this influences our capacity for adaptive or maladaptive neural plasticity. To do this, I use transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to study changes in the output of the motor areas of the brain and somatosensory evoked potentials (SEPs) to study processing of incoming sensory signals by the brain. It is critical to understand the role of asymmetry in the cortical control of movement as well as how sensory disruptions during movement influence plasticity in order to ensure that advances in technology lead to adaptive plasticity rather than maladaptive plasticity. This will provide important knowledge to influence the design of technology for recreational and occupational activities, helping to protect the health and productivity of Canadians in our technology dependent world.