Changes in Muscle Synergy Organization After Neurological Lesions

Abstract

The role of the cerebral cortex and the cerebellum in determining the spatiotemporal characteristics of the muscle activation patterns is still largely unknown. Recent studies suggest that the coordination of the muscles relies on flexible combinations of a few muscle synergies. We aim at gaining new insights on the neural organization of the muscle patterns for reaching by using multidimensional decomposition algorithms to identify muscle synergies in patients with damage to the cerebral cortex and to the cerebellum. Understanding the changes in the modular organization of the motor system after neurological lesions is highly relevant for upper limb rehabilitation because it may lead to the development of novel objective and quantitative indicators of motor impairment directly related to a specific pathophysiology.