Time is a rubberband: neuronal activity in monkey motor cortex in relation to time estimation

Renoult, Louis; Roux, Sébastiên; Riehle, Alexa

doi:10.1111/j.1460-9568.2006.04824.x

Cited by 61 publications

(65 citation statements)

References 40 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…This widespread phenomenon of preactivation was only observed with predictable cue timing. However, its function is still unclear: it could participate in a general timing process of the cue (Durstewitz, 2004;Nobre, 2008, Fujioka et al, 2012), or be part of a preparatory process in anticipation of a future motor event, similar to what was found before movement onset (Lucchetti and Bon, 2001;Renoult et al, 2006;Lebedev et al, 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 52%

On the Anticipatory Precue Activity in Motor Cortex

et al. 2012

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Motor cortical neurons are activated during movement preparation and execution, and in response to task-relevant visual cues. A few studies also report activation before the expected presentation of cues. Here, we study specifically this anticipatory activity preceding visual cues in motor cortical areas. We recorded the activity of 1215 neurons in the motor cortex of two macaque monkeys while they performed a center-out reaching task, including two consecutive delays of equal duration, known in advance. During the first delay (D1), they had to await the spatial cue and only reach to the cued target after the second delay (D2). Forty-two percent of the neurons displayed anticipatory activity during D1. Among these anticipatory neurons, 59% increased (D1up) their activity and the remaining decreased (D1down) their activity. By classifying the neurons according to these firing rate profiles during D1, we found that the activity during D2 differed in a systematic way. The D1up neurons were more likely to discharge phasically soon after the spatial cue and were less active during movement execution, whereas the D1down neurons showed the opposite pattern. But, regardless of their temporal activity profiles, the two categories seemed equally involved in early and late motor preparation, as reflected in their directional selectivity. This precue activity in motor cortex may reflect two complementary, coexisting processes: the facilitation of incoming spatial information in parallel with the downregulation of corticospinal excitability to prevent a premature response.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 52%

On the Anticipatory Precue Activity in Motor Cortex

et al. 2012

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…For example, neural activity related to elapsed time has been reported in prefrontal cortex during duration reproduction (Jech et al, 2005), and in LIP during time interval (Leon and Shadlen, 2003) and motion discrimination (Churchland et al, 2008). During instructed delays with different possible durations, as each of the likely GO signal times approaches there is a buildup of neural activity in LIP during saccade tasks (Janssen and Shadlen, 2005), and in motor cortex during reaching tasks (Renoult et al, 2006), with corresponding changes of corticospinal excitability (van Elswijk et al, 2007). More generally, buildup activity has been reported in a variety of brain regions even during motor tasks that do not involve any decisions (Hanes and Schall, 1996;Munoz et al, 2000;Ivry and Spencer, 2004;Roesch and Olson, 2005;Tanaka, 2007;Thomas and Paré, 2007;Lebedev et al, 2008).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Decisions in Changing Conditions: The Urgency-Gating Model

Cisek¹,

Puskas²,

El-Murr³

2009

J. Neurosci.

466

714

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Several widely accepted models of decision making suggest that, during simple decision tasks, neural activity builds up until a threshold is reached and a decision is made. These models explain error rates and reaction time distributions in a variety of tasks and are supported by neurophysiological studies showing that neural activity in several cortical and subcortical regions gradually builds up at a rate related to task difficulty and reaches a relatively constant level of discharge at a time that predicts movement initiation. The mechanism responsible for this buildup is believed to be related to the temporal integration of sequential samples of sensory information. However, an alternative mechanism that may explain the neural and behavioral data is one in which the buildup of activity is instead attributable to a growing signal related to the urgency to respond, which multiplicatively modulates updated estimates of sensory evidence. These models are difficult to distinguish when, as in previous studies, subjects are presented with constant sensory evidence throughout each trial. To distinguish the models, we presented human subjects with a task in which evidence changed over the course of each trial. Our results are more consistent with "urgency gating" than with temporal integration of sensory samples and suggest a simple mechanism for implementing trade-offs between the speed and accuracy of decisions.

show abstract

“…Studies report that temporal estimates of planned movements are encoded by populations of single neurons that monotonically modulate firing rate in proportion to the estimate, referred to as temporal scaling (Merchant et al, 2013a;Wittmann, 2013). Such neuronal behavior has been identified throughout the cortex (Goldman-Rakic, 1995;Crammond and Kalaska, 2000;Matell et al, 2003Matell et al, , 2011Roux et al, 2003;Lebedev et al, , 2008Reutimann et al, 2004;Merchant et al, 2004a, b;Janssen and Shadlen, 2005;Merchant and Georgopoulos, 2006;Maimon and Assad, 2006;Renoult et al, 2006;Genovesio et al, 2009;Mita et al, 2009;Knudsen et al, 2012;Kim et al, 2013) and across different behavioral tasks. We recently extended this phenomena to subpopulations of neurons within the hindlimb sensorimotor cortex (HLSMC) of rats producing timed hindlimb movements (Knudsen et al, 2012).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dissociating Movement from Movement Timing in the Rat Primary Motor Cortex

2014

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Neural encoding of the passage of time to produce temporally precise movements remains an open question. Neurons in several brain regions across different experimental contexts encode estimates of temporal intervals by scaling their activity in proportion to the interval duration. In motor cortex the degree to which this scaled activity relies upon afferent feedback and is guided by motor output remains unclear. Using a neural reward paradigm to dissociate neural activity from motor output before and after complete spinal transection, we show that temporally scaled activity occurs in the rat hindlimb motor cortex in the absence of motor output and after transection. Context-dependent changes in the encoding are plastic, reversible, and re-established following injury. Therefore, in the absence of motor output and despite a loss of afferent feedback, thought necessary for timed movements, the rat motor cortex displays scaled activity during a broad range of temporally demanding tasks similar to that identified in other brain regions.

show abstract

Time is a rubberband: neuronal activity in monkey motor cortex in relation to time estimation

Cited by 61 publications

References 40 publications

On the Anticipatory Precue Activity in Motor Cortex

On the Anticipatory Precue Activity in Motor Cortex

Decisions in Changing Conditions: The Urgency-Gating Model

Dissociating Movement from Movement Timing in the Rat Primary Motor Cortex

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About