AUTHOR=Lai Dongrong , Wan Zijun , Lin Jiafan , Pan Li , Ren Feixiao , Zhu Junming , Zhang Jianmin , Wang Yueming , Hao Yaoyao , Xu Kedi TITLE=Neuronal representation of bimanual arm motor imagery in the motor cortex of a tetraplegia human, a pilot study JOURNAL=Frontiers in Neuroscience VOLUME=17 YEAR=2023 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neuroscience/articles/10.3389/fnins.2023.1133928 DOI=10.3389/fnins.2023.1133928 ISSN=1662-453X ABSTRACT=Introduction

How the human brain coordinates bimanual movements is not well-established.

Methods

Here, we recorded neural signals from a paralyzed individual’s left motor cortex during both unimanual and bimanual motor imagery tasks and quantified the representational interaction between arms by analyzing the tuning parameters of each neuron.

Results

We found a similar proportion of neurons preferring each arm during unimanual movements, however, when switching to bimanual movements, the proportion of contralateral preference increased to 71.8%, indicating contralateral lateralization. We also observed a decorrelation process for each arm’s representation across the unimanual and bimanual tasks. We further confined that these changes in bilateral relationships are mainly caused by the alteration of tuning parameters, such as the increased bilateral preferred direction (PD) shifts and the significant suppression in bilateral modulation depths (MDs), especially the ipsilateral side.

Discussion

These results contribute to the knowledge of bimanual coordination and thus the design of cutting-edge bimanual brain-computer interfaces.