Abstract
Cerebellar plasticity is a critical mechanism for optimal feedback control. While Purkinje cell activity of the oculomotor vermis predicts eye movement speed and direction, more lateral areas of the cerebellum may play a role in more complex tasks, including decision-making. It is still under question how this motor-cognitive functional dichotomy between medial and lateral areas of the cerebellum plays a role in optimal feedback control. Here we show that elite athletes subjected to a trajectory prediction, go/no-go task manifest superior subsecond trajectory prediction accompanied by optimal eye movements and changes in cognitive load dynamics. Moreover, while interacting with the cerebral cortex, both the medial and lateral cerebellar networks are prominently activated during the fast feedback stage of the task, regardless of whether or not a motor response was required for the correct response. Our results show that cortico-cerebellar interactions are widespread during dynamic feedback and that experience can result in superior task-specific decision skills.
Highlights
The cerebellum is an important site of plasticity for motor learning and part of a larger network consisting of both cortical and subcortical brain areas that support functions such as Sciences, 1105 BA Amsterdam, The Netherlands 6 Amsterdam UMC, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Department of Anatomy & Neurosciences, Amsterdam Neuroscience, de Boelelaan, 1117 Amsterdam, Netherlands adaptation of movements, temporal processing [1], and spatiotemporal prediction [2]
When contrasting only correct rejections during fast and medium stimulus speeds, we observed differential activity in the vermis and bilateral cerebellar cortex crus I and II (Zmax = 4.19), in addition to the bilateral inferior parietal lobe (Zmax = 3.96), bilateral somatomotor cortex (Zmax = 4.07), left frontal operculum (Zmax = 4.1), and middle frontal gyrus (Zmax = 4.25) (Fig. 3d; Table 1). These results indicate that our task recruits both medial and lateral cerebellar regions that are co-active with a network of cortical areas when temporal conditions change, regardless of whether or not a motor response is required for the correct response
The first part of a real pitch necessitates pattern and trajectory prediction followed by a go/ no-go decision, while the latter part of the pitch requires pupil dynamics were related to performance, when a motor response was involved
Summary
Increasing evidence has surfaced indicating that the cerebellum may moderate cognitive control in both humans and animals when strict temporal processing is required [3,4,5]. In less than 500 ms, the batter must watch the ball coming out of the pitcher’s hand (preparatory period), recognize the pattern of the seams on the ball and interpolate the spin (pattern recognition), and integrate that information with the expected trajectory and speed of the pitch (timed trajectory prediction) in order to determine whether it will pass through the strike zone or not (a go/no-go decision). The act of hitting in baseball consists of discrete trials that require several categorically different sequential cognitive and motor processes in a very short amount of time
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