Neural control of skilled movements
Introduction
The highest levels of sensory, motor and cognitive function can be located in the cerebral cortex and the motor expression of our behaviour is organized in the motor areas of the cerebral cortex. Damage to these areas by disease or injury can result in complete paralysis of the affected limbs. Recovery from such damage varies and long term motor deficits include loss of skilled movement, prominent muscle weakness and spasticity. The work in our laboratory involves anatomical and physiological studies of normal and lesioned cortex. We study of how movement is represented in cerebral motor areas and the way in which this representation is altered by cerebral injury and disease. We also study the connections of motor cortex with other parts of the brain, the influence of sensory signals from muscle and skin receptors on motor cortical neurons, and neural activity associated with movement performance. We are interested in finding how the brain learns and controls skilled movements, how brain injury or disease affects the working of the brain, and neural reorganization associated with the recovery of function. We use neuroanatomical tracers to study brain connections and electrophysiological techniques to record neural activity associated with movement.
From the time we are born the motor areas of the brain learn to control the muscles of our body, to enable us to sit and stand, walk and run, to reach and grasp and to acquire the finest motor skills needed in sporting, artistic and intellectual pursuits.
Some of the important brain centres for the learning and performance of skilled movements include the motor areas of the cerebral cortex, whose locations are labeled in an illustration of the surface of the cerebral hemispheres.
