Unimanual sensorimotor learning—A simultaneous EEG-fMRI aging study

Sabrina Chettouf*, Paul Triebkorn, Andreas Daffertshofer, Petra Ritter

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to JournalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Sensorimotor coordination requires orchestrated network activity in the brain, mediated by inter- and intra-hemispheric interactions that may be affected by aging-related changes. We adopted a theoretical model, according to which intra-hemispheric inhibition from premotor to primary motor cortex is mandatory to compensate for inter-hemispheric excitation through the corpus callosum. To test this as a function of age we acquired electroencephalography (EEG) simultaneously with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in two groups of healthy adults (younger N = 13: 20–25 year and older N = 14: 59–70 year) while learning a unimanual motor task. On average, quality of performance of older participants stayed significantly below that of the younger ones. Accompanying decreases in motor-event-related EEG β-activity were lateralized toward contralateral motor regions, albeit more so in younger participants. In this younger group, the mean β-power during motor task execution was significantly higher in bilateral premotor areas compared to the older adults. In both groups, fMRI blood oxygen level dependent (BOLD) signals were positively correlated with source-reconstructed β-amplitudes: positive in primary motor and negative in premotor cortex. This suggests that β-amplitude modulation is associated with primary motor cortex “activation” (positive BOLD response) and premotor “deactivation” (negative BOLD response). Although the latter results did not discriminate between age groups, they underscore that enhanced modulation in primary motor cortex may be explained by a β-associated excitatory crosstalk between hemispheres.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)2348-2364
Number of pages17
JournalHuman Brain Mapping
Volume43
Issue number7
Early online date8 Feb 2022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - May 2022

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Part of the computation has been performed on the High-Performance Computing for Research cluster of the Berlin Institute of Health. PR acknowledges support by EU H2020 Virtual Brain Cloud 826421, Human Brain Project SGA2 785907; Human Brain Project SGA3 945539, ERC Consolidator 683049; German Research Foundation SFB 1436 (project ID 425899996); SFB 1315 (project ID 327654276); SFB 936 (project ID 178316478); SFB-TRR 295 (project ID 424778381); SPP Computational Connectomics RI 2073/6-1, RI 2073/10-2, RI 2073/9-1; Berlin Institute of Health & Foundation Charit?, Johanna Quandt Excellence Initiative. Open access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.

Funding Information:
Part of the computation has been performed on the High‐Performance Computing for Research cluster of the Berlin Institute of Health. PR acknowledges support by EU H2020 Virtual Brain Cloud 826421, Human Brain Project SGA2 785907; Human Brain Project SGA3 945539, ERC Consolidator 683049; German Research Foundation SFB 1436 (project ID 425899996); SFB 1315 (project ID 327654276); SFB 936 (project ID 178316478); SFB‐TRR 295 (project ID 424778381); SPP Computational Connectomics RI 2073/6‐1, RI 2073/10‐2, RI 2073/9‐1; Berlin Institute of Health & Foundation Charité, Johanna Quandt Excellence Initiative. Open access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.

Funding Information:
ERC Consolidator, Grant/Award Number: 683049; EU H2020, Grant/Award Numbers: Human Brain Project SGA2 785907, Human Brain Project SGA3 945539, Virtual Brain Cloud 826421; German Research Foundation, Grant/Award Numbers: SFB 1315 (project ID 327654276), SFB 1436 (project ID 425899996), SFB 936 (project ID 178316478), SFB‐TRR 295 (project ID 424778381); SPP Computational Connectomics, Grant/Award Numbers: RI 2073/10‐2, RI 2073/6‐1, RI 2073/9‐1 Funding information

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Authors. Human Brain Mapping published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.

Keywords

  • aging
  • coordination
  • intra-hemispheric inhibition
  • motor learning
  • motor network
  • perceptual motor behavior

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