Predictive Motor Timing Research Articles

Functional Imaging of the Cerebellum and Basal Ganglia During Predictive Motor Timing in Early Parkinson's Disease

The basal ganglia and the cerebellum have both emerged as important structures involved in the processing of temporal information. We examined the roles of the cerebellum and striatum in predictive motor timing during a target interception task in healthy individuals (HC group; n = 21) and in patients with early Parkinson's disease (early stage PD group; n = 20) using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Despite having similar hit ratios, the PD failed more often than the HC to postpone their actions until the right moment and to adapt their behavior from one trial to the next. We found more activation in the right cerebellar lobule VI in HC than in early stage PD during successful trials. Successful trial-by-trial adjustments were associated with higher activity in the right putamen and lobule VI of the cerebellum in HC. We conclude that both the cerebellum and striatum are involved in predictive motor timing tasks. The cerebellar activity is associated exclusively with the postponement of action until the right moment, whereas both the cerebellum and striatum are needed for successful adaptation of motor actions from one trial to the next. We found a general ''hypoactivation'' of basal ganglia and cerebellum in early stage PD relative to HC, indicating that even in early stages of the PD there could be functional perturbations in the motor system beyond striatum.

The Neural Substrate of Predictive Motor Timing in Spinocerebellar Ataxia

The neural mechanisms involved in motor timing are subcortical, involving mainly cerebellum and basal ganglia. However, the role played by these structures in predictive motor timing is not well understood. Unlike motor timing, which is often tested using rhythm production tasks, predictive motor timing requires visuo-motor coordination in anticipation of a future event, and it is evident in behaviors such as catching a ball or shooting a moving target. We examined the role of the cerebellum and striatum in predictive motor timing in a target interception task in healthy (n = 12) individuals and in subjects (n = 9) with spinocerebellar ataxia types 6 and 8. The performance of the healthy subjects was better than that of the spinocerebellar ataxia. Successful performance in both groups was associated with increased activity in the cerebellum (right dentate nucleus, left uvula (lobule V), and lobule VI), thalamus, and in several cortical areas. The superior performance in the controls was related to activation in thalamus, putamen (lentiform nucleus) and cerebellum (right dentate nucleus and culmen-lobule IV), which were not activated either in the spinocerebellar subjects or within a subgroup of controls who performed poorly. Both the cerebellum and the basal ganglia are necessary for the predictive motor timing. The degeneration of the cerebellum associated with spinocerebellar types 6 and 8 appears to lead to quantitative rather than qualitative deficits in temporal processing. The lack of any areas with greater activity in the spinocerebellar group than in controls suggests that limited functional reorganization occurs in this condition.

Predictive Motor Timing Performance Dissociates Between Early Diseases of the Cerebellum and Parkinson's Disease

There is evidence that both the basal ganglia and the cerebellum play a role in the neural representation of time in a variety of behaviours, but whether one of them is more important is not yet clear. To address this question in the context of predictive motor timing, we tested patients with various movement disorders implicating these two structures in a motor-timing task. Specifically, we investigated four different groups: (1) patients with early Parkinson's disease (PD); (2) patients with sporadic spinocerebellar ataxia (SCA); (3) patients with familial essential tremor (ET); and (4) matched healthy controls. We used a predictive motor-timing task that involved mediated interception of a moving target, and we assessed the effect of movement type (acceleration, deceleration and constant), speed (slow, medium and fast) and angle (0 degrees , 15 degrees and 30 degrees) on performance (hit, early error and late error). The main results showed that PD group and arm ET subgroup did not significantly differ from the control group. SCA and head ET subjects (severe and mild cerebellar damage, respectively) were significantly worse at interception than the other two groups. Our findings support the idea that the basal ganglia play a less significant role in predictive motor timing than the cerebellum. The fact that SCA and ET subjects seemed to have a fundamental problem with predictive motor timing suggests that the cerebellum plays an essential role in integrating incoming visual information with the motor output in a timely manner, and that ET is a heterogeneous entity that deserves increased attention from clinicians.

A model of time estimation and error feedback in predictive timing behavior

Two key features of sensorimotor prediction are preprogramming and adjusting of performance based on previous experience. Oculomotor tracking of alternating visual targets provides a simple paradigm to study this behavior in the motor system; subjects make predictive eye movements (saccades) at fast target pacing rates (>0.5 Hz). In addition, the initiation errors (latencies) during predictive tracking are correlated over a small temporal window (correlation window) suggesting that tracking performance within this time range is used in the feedback process of the timing behavior. In this paper, we propose a closed-loop model of this predictive timing. In this model, the timing between movements is based on an internal estimation of stimulus timing (an internal clock), which is represented by a (noisy) signal integrated to a threshold. The threshold of the integrate-to-fire mechanism is determined by the timing between movements made within the correlation window of previous performance and adjusted by feedback of recent and projected initiation error. The correlation window size increases with repeated tracking and was estimated by two independent experiments. We apply the model to several experimental paradigms and show that it produces data specific to predictive tracking: a gradual shift from reaction to prediction on initial tracking, phase transition and hysteresis as pacing frequency changes, scalar property, continuation of predictive tracking despite perturbations, and intertrial correlations of a specific form. These results suggest that the process underlying repetitive predictive motor timing is adjusted by the performance and the corresponding errors accrued over a limited time range and that this range increases with continued confidence in previous performance.

The role of the cerebellum and basal ganglia in early Parkinson’s disease in motor timing prediction task: behavioral and fMRI study

Event Abstract Back to Event The role of the cerebellum and basal ganglia in early Parkinson’s disease in motor timing prediction task: behavioral and fMRI study Martin Bareš1*, I. Husárová1, O.V Lungu2, R. Mareček1, M. Mikl1, T. Gescheidt1 and P. Krupa1 1 Masaryk University, Czechia 2 University of Montreal, Canada Objectives: Recently published studies demonstrated that the cerebellum and basal ganglia participate in motor timing tasks related to prediction. However, there is a debate as to the role played by these structures. To answer the question about exact role of the basal ganglia in predictive motor timing we studied patients with early Parkinson’s disease (PD) as a model of basal ganglia disorder. Methods: Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we tested the role of the cerebellum and BG in a dynamic timing prediction task that involved mediated interception of a moving target. The sample consisting of 20 patients with early PD (PD subjects) and 20 healthy age-matched healthy subjects (controls) performed a task in which they had to press a button to intercept a moving target on a computer screen. FMRI data were processed using SPM2. We considered three basic results for further evaluation – effect of hits, early errors, late errors – and their contrasts. The contrast hits minus all errors design was utilized to establish the comparison between PD subjects and controls. Results: The behavioral performance of the two sample groups on the timing prediction task was not found to be statistically significant. The fMRI analysis did not show the statistical significant difference in the activation in studied subcortical regions (PD subjects minus controls, hits minus all errors, p<0.05 FWE, corrected). Nevertheless, fMRI showed variability in regard to the location of brain activation during the task. While strong activity was found in the bilateral cerebellar lobes and the basal ganglia in controls, PD subjects showed increased activity in the basal ganglia only. Conclusion: These results stressed out the essential role of the cerebellum in motor timing prediction. The PD subjects seem to utilize different strategies and alternative functional circuits to maintain the same successful performance ratio. The basal ganglia involvement in predictive motor timing is inferior to the cerebellum. Supported by Research Project MSM0021622404. Conference: 10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience, Bodrum, Turkey, 1 Sep - 5 Sep, 2008. Presentation Type: Oral Presentation Topic: Neuropsychiatric Disorders Citation: Bareš M, Husárová I, Lungu O, Mareček R, Mikl M, Gescheidt T and Krupa P (2008). The role of the cerebellum and basal ganglia in early Parkinson’s disease in motor timing prediction task: behavioral and fMRI study. Conference Abstract: 10th International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience. doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.09.2009.01.392 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 17 Dec 2008; Published Online: 17 Dec 2008. * Correspondence: Martin Bareš, Masaryk University, Brno, Czechia, martin.bares@fnusa.cz Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Martin Bareš I. Husárová O.V Lungu R. Mareček M. Mikl T. Gescheidt P. Krupa Google Martin Bareš I. Husárová O.V Lungu R. Mareček M. Mikl T. Gescheidt P. Krupa Google Scholar Martin Bareš I. Husárová O.V Lungu R. Mareček M. Mikl T. Gescheidt P. Krupa PubMed Martin Bareš I. Husárová O.V Lungu R. Mareček M. Mikl T. Gescheidt P. Krupa Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.

Impaired predictive motor timing in patients with cerebellar disorders

The ability to precisely time events is essential for both perception and action. There is evidence that the cerebellum is important for the neural representation of time in a variety of behaviors including time perception, the tapping of specific time intervals, and eye-blink conditioning. It has been difficult to assess the contribution of the cerebellum to timing during more dynamic motor behavior because the component movements themselves may be abnormal or any motor deficit may be due to an inability to combine the component movements into a complete action rather than timing per se. Here we investigated the performance of subjects with cerebellar disease in predictive motor timing using a task that involved mediated interception of a moving target, and we tested the effect of movement type (acceleration, deceleration, constant), speed (slow, medium, fast), and angle (0 degrees , 15 degrees and 30 degrees) on performance. The subjects with cerebellar damage were significantly worse at interception than healthy controls even when we controlled for basic motor impairments such as response time. Our data suggest that subjects with damage to the cerebellum have a fundamental problem with predictive motor timing and indicate that the cerebellum plays an essential role in integrating incoming visual information with motor output when making predictions about upcoming actions. The findings demonstrate that the cerebellum may have properties that would facilitate the processing or storage of internal models of motor behavior.