23One hallmark of natural motor control is the brain's ability to adapt to perturbations ranging 24 from temporary visual-motor rotations to paresis caused by stroke. These adaptations require 25 modifications of learned neural patterns that can span the time-course of minutes to months. 26Previous work has shown that populations of neurons fire on coordinated low-dimensional 27 subspaces that are resistant to changes, and perturbations requiring neural activity to move 28 outside of these subspaces are difficult to learn. Subsequently, perturbations that remain within 29 the neural subspace are easier to adapt to. However, it is unclear how motor cortex might 30 respond to perturbations whilst still learning. To answer this question, five nonhuman primates 31 were used in three brain-machine interface (BMI) experiments, which allowed us to track how 32 2 specific populations of neurons changed firing patterns as task performance improved. In each 33 experiment, neural intentions were estimated with biomimetic decoders that were periodically 34 refit, creating perturbations throughout learning. We found that decoder perturbations caused 35 neurons to increase exploratory patterns on within-day timescales without hindering previously 36 consolidated patterns regardless of task performance. The flexible modulation of these 37 exploratory patterns in contrast to relatively stable consolidated activity suggests a concomitant 38 exploration-exploitation strategy that adapts existing neural patterns during learning. 39 40 42can adapt depends on the similarity to previously learned behaviors and the time allowed for 43
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