Movement Preparation and Bilateral Modulation of Beta Activity in Aging and Parkinson’s Disease

Abstract

In previous studies of young subjects performing a reaction-time reaching task, we found that faster reaction times are associated with increased suppression of beta power over primary sensorimotor areas just before target presentation. Here we ascertain whether such beta decrease similarly occurs in normally aging subjects and also in patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD), where deficits in movement execution and abnormalities of beta power are usually present. We found that in both groups, beta power decreased during the motor task in the electrodes over the two primary sensorimotor areas. However, before target presentation, beta decreases in PD were significantly smaller over the right than over the left areas, while they were symmetrical in controls. In both groups, functional connectivity between the two regions, measured with imaginary coherence, increased before the target appearance; however, in PD, it decreased immediately after, while in controls, it remained elevated throughout motor planning. As in previous studies with young subjects, the degree of beta power before target appearance correlated with reaction time. The values of coherence during motor planning, instead, correlated with movement time, peak velocity and acceleration. We conclude that planning of prompt and fast movements partially depends on coordinated beta activity of both sensorimotor areas, already at the time of target presentation. The delayed onset of beta decreases over the right region observed in PD is possibly related to a decreased functional connectivity between the two areas, and this might account for deficits in force programming, movement duration and velocity modulation.

Striatal Dopaminergic Innervation Regulates Subthalamic Beta-Oscillations and Cortical-Subcortical Coupling during Movements: Preliminary Evidence in Subjects with Parkinson’s Disease

“…Topological maps of these parameters showed two main clusters around CCP3h and CCP4h, as described also in previous studies (Alegre et al, 2005; Meziane et al, 2015; Moisello et al, 2015). Accordingly, we defined two region of interest (ROI) of eight electrodes surrounding CCP3h and CCP4h respectively.…”

“…In particular, movement execution and imagination are associated with beta power changes (Cassidy et al, 2002; Kühn et al, 2004), starting with a decrease or desynchronization in the pre-movement period (event-related desynchronization, ERD) followed by a rebound after movement termination (event-related synchronization, ERS; Cassidy et al, 2002). A similar dynamic pattern of movement-related beta modulation is also present at the cortical level with a morphology that does not substantially differ from that recorded from control subjects (Soikkeli et al, 1991; Alegre et al, 2005; Devos et al, 2006; Meziane et al, 2015; Moisello et al, 2015). Moreover, excessive cortical beta power at rest has been recently correlated with greater movement-related beta-modulation and motor performances (Heinrichs-Graham and Wilson, 2016).…”

Brain electrical activity signatures during performance of the Multisource Interference Task

“…On the other hand, prestimulus alpha power is negatively correlated with RTs, suggesting that alpha oscillations prior to stimulus presentation boost stimulus processing and thus speed up performance (Nenert, Viswanathan, Dubuc, & Visscher, ); nevertheless, such results have not always been observed (see Mazaheri, Nieuwenhuis, Van Dijk, & Jensen, ; van Dijk, Schoffelen, Oostenveld, & Jensen, ). Finally, beta power is also related to RTs and directly correlated with speed of execution (Meziane et al, ; Zhang, Wang, Bressler, Chen, & Ding, ). In the present study, we attempt to clarify the correlation between EEG oscillatory activity and reaction times in the MSIT, by studying single‐trial within‐subject correlations for each of the mentioned bands across conditions.…”

Effect of multichannel transcranial direct current stimulation to reduce hypertonia in individuals with prolonged disorders of consciousness: A randomized controlled pilot study

“…For instance, degree of betafrequency resting-state functional connectivity between M1 and the anterior prefrontal cortex were found to predict subsequent degree of motor adaptation in healthy volunteers, which suggests that the resting-state synchronization dynamics can predict the degree of motor adaptation in a healthy population [21]. In stroke, beta coherence in the somatosensory areas is increased during movement planning and associated with velocity of movement [22]. In addition, central inter-hemispheric beta coherence was found linked to motor function recovery, patients with higher interhemispheric coherence presenting higher motor function recovery after stroke [23].…”