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The Journal of Neuroscience, February 13, 2008, 28(7):1728-1732; doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.4662-07.2008

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Brief Communications
Coordinate Transformation is First Completed Downstream of Primary Motor Cortex

Yuval Yanai,¹ Nofya Adamit,¹ Zvi Israel,² Ran Harel,³ and Yifat Prut¹

¹Department of Physiology and the Interdisciplinary Center for Neural Computation, Hadassah Medical School, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem 91120 Israel, ²Department of Neurosurgery, Hadassah Hospital, Jerusalem 91120, Israel, and ³Department of Neurosurgery, Sheba Medical Center, Tel Aviv 52621, Israel

Correspondence should be addressed to Yifat Prut, Department of Physiology, Hadassah Medical School, The Hebrew University, P.O. Box 12272, Jerusalem 91120, Israel. Email: yifatpr{at}ekmd.huji.ac.il

It was suggested previously that the transformation of action to muscle-based coding is completed in the primary motor cortex (M1). This is consistent with a predominant direct pathway leading from M1 to motoneurons. Accordingly, spinal segmental interneurons that are located downstream to M1 are expected to show muscle-like coding properties. We addressed this hypothesis using simultaneous recording of cortical and spinal activity in primates performing an isometric wrist task with multiple targets and two hand postures. Here we show that while the motor cortex follows an intermediate coordinate frame, spinal interneurons already follow a muscle-like coordinate frame. We thus suggest that the final steps in coordinate transformation of motor commands take place downstream of M1 via corticospinal interactions.

Key words: motor cortex; spinal cord; directional tuning; coordinate frames; EMG; motor control

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Received Oct. 14, 2007; revised Nov. 25, 2007; accepted Dec. 18, 2007.

Correspondence should be addressed to Yifat Prut, Department of Physiology, Hadassah Medical School, The Hebrew University, P.O. Box 12272, Jerusalem 91120, Israel. Email: yifatpr{at}ekmd.huji.ac.il

This article has been cited by other articles:

				I. Asher, N. Zinger, Y. Yanai, Z. Israel, and Y. Prut Population-Based Corticospinal Interactions in Macaques Are Correlated with Visuomotor Processing Cereb Cortex, May 14, 2009; (2009) bhp095v1. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				P. Bedard and J. N. Sanes Gaze and Hand Position Effects on Finger-Movement-Related Human Brain Activation J Neurophysiol, February 1, 2009; 101(2): 834 - 842. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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