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The Journal of Neuroscience, September 19, 2007, 27(38):10106-10115; doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2632-07.2007

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Behavioral/Systems/Cognitive
Parallel Evolution of Cortical Areas Involved in Skilled Hand Use

Jeffrey Padberg,¹ João G. Franca,³ Dylan F. Cooke,¹ Juliana G. M. Soares,³ Marcello G. P. Rosa,⁴ Mario Fiorani, Jr,³ Ricardo Gattass,³ and Leah Krubitzer^1,2

¹Center for Neuroscience, ²Department of Psychology, University of California, Davis, California 95618, ³Instituto de Biofisica Carlos Chagas Filho, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, CEP 21941-902, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and ⁴Department of Physiology, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria 3800, Australia

Correspondence should be addressed to Leah Krubitzer, Center for Neuroscience, University of California, Davis, 1544 Newton Court, Davis, CA 95618. Email: lakrubitzer{at}ucdavis.edu

Dexterous hands, used to manipulate food, tools, and other objects, are one of the hallmarks of primate evolution. However, the neural substrate of fine manual control necessary for these behaviors remains unclear. Here, we describe the functional organization of parietal cortical areas 2 and 5 in the cebus monkey. Whereas other New World monkeys can be quite dexterous, and possess a poorly developed area 5, cebus monkeys are the only New World primate known to use a precision grip, and thus have an extended repertoire of manual behaviors. Unlike other New World Monkeys, but much like the macaque monkey, cebus monkeys possess a proprioceptive cortical area 2 and a well developed area 5, which is associated with motor planning and the generation of internal body coordinates necessary for visually guided reaching, grasping, and manipulation. The similarity of these fields in cebus monkeys and distantly related macaque monkeys with similar manual abilities indicates that the range of cortical organizations that can emerge in primates is constrained, and those that emerge are the result of highly conserved developmental mechanisms that shape the boundaries and topographic organizations of cortical areas.

Key words: area 2; area 5; posterior parietal cortex; primate evolution; reaching; grasping

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Received June 9, 2007; revised July 23, 2007; accepted July 30, 2007.

Correspondence should be addressed to Leah Krubitzer, Center for Neuroscience, University of California, Davis, 1544 Newton Court, Davis, CA 95618. Email: lakrubitzer{at}ucdavis.edu

This article has been cited by other articles:

				S.B. Eickhoff, C. Grefkes, G.R. Fink, and K. Zilles Functional Lateralization of Face, Hand, and Trunk Representation in Anatomically Defined Human Somatosensory Areas Cereb Cortex, March 27, 2008; (2008) bhn039v1. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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