Neural substrates of intermanual transfer of a newly acquired motor skill.

@article{citeulike:2892976, abstract = {In healthy humans, the two cerebral hemispheres show functional specialization to a degree unmatched in other animals, and such strong hemispheric specialization contributes to unimanual skill acquisition [1, 2]. When most humans learn a new motor skill with one hand, this process results in performance improvements in the opposite hand as well [3-6]. Despite the obvious adaptive advantage of such intermanual transfer, there is no direct evidence identifying the neural substrates of this form of skill acquisition [7-9]. Here, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to study brain regions activated during intermanual transfer of a learned sequence of finger movements. First, we found that the supplementary motor area (SMA) has more activity when a skill has transferred well than when it has transferred poorly. Second, we found that fMRI activity in the ventrolateral posterior thalamic nucleus correlated with successful future intermanual transfer, whereas activity in the ventrolateral anterior thalamic nucleus correlated with past intermanual transfer. Third, we found that repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation applied over the SMA blocked intermanual transfer without affecting skill acquisition. These findings provide direct evidence for an SMA-based mechanism that supports intermanual transfer of motor-skill learning.}, address = {Human Cortical Physiology Section and Stroke Neurorehabilitation Clinic, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health, 10 Center Drive, Bethesda, Maryland 20892-1430.}, author = {Perez, M. A. and Tanaka, S. and Wise, S. P. and Sadato, N. and Tanabe, H. C. and Willingham, D. T. and Cohen, L. G. }, citeulike-article-id = {2892976}, doi = {10.1016/j.cub.2007.09.058}, issn = {0960-9822}, journal = {Current biology : CB}, keywords = {action, learning, nichola}, month = {November}, number = {21}, pages = {1896--1902}, posted-at = {2008-06-13 20:41:42}, priority = {2}, title = {Neural substrates of intermanual transfer of a newly acquired motor skill.}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2007.09.058}, volume = {17}, year = {2007} }

TY - JOUR ID - citeulike:2892976 L3 - citeulike-article-id:2892976 TI - Neural substrates of intermanual transfer of a newly acquired motor skill. JF - Current biology : CB VL - 17 IS - 21 SP - 1896 EP - 1902 AD - Human Cortical Physiology Section and Stroke Neurorehabilitation Clinic, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health, 10 Center Drive, Bethesda, Maryland 20892-1430. SN - 0960-9822 N2 - In healthy humans, the two cerebral hemispheres show functional specialization to a degree unmatched in other animals, and such strong hemispheric specialization contributes to unimanual skill acquisition [1, 2]. When most humans learn a new motor skill with one hand, this process results in performance improvements in the opposite hand as well [3-6]. Despite the obvious adaptive advantage of such intermanual transfer, there is no direct evidence identifying the neural substrates of this form of skill acquisition [7-9]. Here, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to study brain regions activated during intermanual transfer of a learned sequence of finger movements. First, we found that the supplementary motor area (SMA) has more activity when a skill has transferred well than when it has transferred poorly. Second, we found that fMRI activity in the ventrolateral posterior thalamic nucleus correlated with successful future intermanual transfer, whereas activity in the ventrolateral anterior thalamic nucleus correlated with past intermanual transfer. Third, we found that repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation applied over the SMA blocked intermanual transfer without affecting skill acquisition. These findings provide direct evidence for an SMA-based mechanism that supports intermanual transfer of motor-skill learning. KW - action KW - learning KW - nichola AU - Perez, MA AU - Tanaka, S AU - Wise, SP AU - Sadato, N AU - Tanabe, HC AU - Willingham, DT AU - Cohen, LG PY - 2007/11/06/ UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2007.09.058 ER -