Control of Movement in Health and Disease

我的研究计划的长期目标是了解神经系统如何产生运动。最终，我的目标是将这些知识应用于开发与神经系统非常自然地相互作用的智能设备。 神经系统能够产生优雅的动作，毫不费力地适应我们的环境。分布在大脑不同部位的多个神经成分负责这种优雅的运动生成。虽然这些组成部分已被广泛研究，但其功能组织和连接仍然不清楚。此外，他们参与学习和适应新环境的情况仍然不清楚。了解这些神经组件是如何连接的，以及每个组件在不断变化的环境中产生运动时所扮演的角色，将使我们能够在未来开发出更智能的机器人。它还将使我们能够弄清楚设备和人类如何作为一个连续的实体一起工作。 ** 在这项研究计划中，我们将研究每个神经组件如何独立运作，以及如何通过使用中断的神经连接模型来参与适应新环境。这些模型将一个或多个组件彼此隔离。我们将看到这种隔离如何影响运动的产生以及运动的外观。然后，我们将对产生运动的环境进行改变，并观察隔离如何影响神经系统学习适应新环境的程度。* * 了解人们如何学习以及他们如何适应环境将教会我们允许人们与设备进行良好交互的主要原则，例如设备感觉就像它是身体的一部分。了解这些原理将有助于我们在未来设计出更好的设备，并确保这些设备帮助人们提高他们的能力。

The long-term goal of my research program is to understand how the nervous system generates movements. Ultimately, my goal is to apply this knowledge towards developing intelligent devices that very naturally interact with the nervous system. The nervous system is capable of producing graceful movements that effortlessly adapt to our environment. Multiple neural components that are distributed in different parts of the brain are responsible for this elegance in movement generation. While these components have been extensively studied, their functional organization and connectivity remains unclear. Also, their involvement in learning and adapting to new environments remains unclear. Understanding how these neural components are connected and the role each plays in generating movements in changing environments will allow us in the future to develop more intelligent robots. It will also allow us to figure out how devices and humans can work together as one continuous entity. ******In this research program we will study how each of the neural components functions on its own and how it participates in adapting to new environments by using models of disrupted neural connectivity. There models isolate one or more components from each other. We will see how this isolation affects how movements are generated and what the movements look like. We will then apply changes to the environment in which the movements are generated, and see how the isolation affects how well the nervous system learns to adapt to the new environments. ******The knowledge we gain from this work will be extremely valuable. Knowing how people learn and how they adapt to their environment will teach us the primary principles that allow people to interact so well with a device, such that the device feels as though it is part of the body. Understanding these principles will help us design better devices in the future and make sure that these devices help people improve their abilities.