TY - JOUR
T1 - The human primary somatosensory cortex encodes imagined movement in the absence of sensory information
AU - Jafari, Matiar
AU - Aflalo, Tyson
AU - Chivukula, Srinivas
AU - Kellis, Spencer Sterling
AU - Salas, Michelle Armenta
AU - Norman, Sumner Lee
AU - Pejsa, Kelsie
AU - Liu, Charles Yu
AU - Andersen, Richard Alan
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, The Author(s).
PY - 2020/12
Y1 - 2020/12
N2 - Classical systems neuroscience positions primary sensory areas as early feed-forward processing stations for refining incoming sensory information. This view may oversimplify their role given extensive bi-directional connectivity with multimodal cortical and subcortical regions. Here we show that single units in human primary somatosensory cortex encode imagined reaches in a cognitive motor task, but not other sensory–motor variables such as movement plans or imagined arm position. A population reference-frame analysis demonstrates coding relative to the cued starting hand location suggesting that imagined reaching movements are encoded relative to imagined limb position. These results imply a potential role for primary somatosensory cortex in cognitive imagery, engagement during motor production in the absence of sensation or expected sensation, and suggest that somatosensory cortex can provide control signals for future neural prosthetic systems.
AB - Classical systems neuroscience positions primary sensory areas as early feed-forward processing stations for refining incoming sensory information. This view may oversimplify their role given extensive bi-directional connectivity with multimodal cortical and subcortical regions. Here we show that single units in human primary somatosensory cortex encode imagined reaches in a cognitive motor task, but not other sensory–motor variables such as movement plans or imagined arm position. A population reference-frame analysis demonstrates coding relative to the cued starting hand location suggesting that imagined reaching movements are encoded relative to imagined limb position. These results imply a potential role for primary somatosensory cortex in cognitive imagery, engagement during motor production in the absence of sensation or expected sensation, and suggest that somatosensory cortex can provide control signals for future neural prosthetic systems.
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U2 - 10.1038/s42003-020-01484-1
DO - 10.1038/s42003-020-01484-1
M3 - Article
C2 - 33311578
AN - SCOPUS:85097489814
SN - 2399-3642
VL - 3
JO - Communications Biology
JF - Communications Biology
IS - 1
M1 - 757
ER -