RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Missing kinaesthesia challenges precise naturalistic cortical prosthetic control
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 004861
DO 10.1101/004861
A1 Ferran Galán
A1 Mark R. Baker
A1 Kai Alter
A1 Stuart N. Baker
YR 2014
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2014/05/06/004861.abstract
AB A major assumption of brain-machine interface (BMI) research is that patients with disconnected neural pathways can still volitionally recall precise motor commands that could be decoded for naturalistic prosthetic control. However, the disconnected condition of these patients also blocks kinaesthetic feedback from the periphery, which has been shown to regulate centrally generated output responsible for accurate motor control. Here we tested how well motor commands are generated in the absence of kinaesthetic feedback by decoding hand movements from human scalp electroencephalography (EEG) in three conditions: unimpaired movement, imagined movement, and movement attempted during temporary disconnection of peripheral afferent and efferent nerves by ischemic nerve block. Our results suggest that the recall of cortical motor commands is impoverished in absence of kinaesthetic feedback, challenging the possibility of precise naturalistic cortical prosthetic control.