Peripersonal Space

Fast and accurate edge orientation processing during object manipulation

“…For the somatosensory system, motor-related signals at different levels of the sensorimotor system can affect virtually all levels of the tactile processing pathway ( Zagha et al, 2013 ; Manita et al, 2015 ; Canedo, 1997 ; Fanselow and Nicolelis, 1999 ; Lee et al, 2008 ; Seki and Fetz, 2012 ; Adams et al, 2013 ) and incoming tactile information can be predictively filtered during action, making it possible for the sensorimotor system to attenuate irrelevant inputs and highlight task-critical information ( Chapman, 1994 ; Bays et al, 2005 ; Blakemore et al, 1999 ). Since our task can be considered a tool-use task, it is also interesting to note that tool use is associated with dynamically remapping of space represented by central multisensory, predominantly tactile neurons ( Maravita and Iriki, 2004 ; Brozzoli et al, 2012 ). However, we are not aware of any studies that have directly compared the neural processing of exactly the same macrogeometric tactile information depending on whether used in fine dexterity tasks or in perceptual judgements.…”

Social impact on audiotactile integration near the body

“…In the field of neurosciences, neurophysiological studies in monkeys as well as brain imaging and lesion studies in humans have evidenced this dichotomy, and showed that PPS is coded in the brain through multisensory integration mechanisms [1][2][3][4]. This dedicated multisensory representation is thought to have a role in apprehending events occurring in the space near the body, which require the implementation of particularly appropriate and precise behaviors: be it for dealing with imminent threat [4] or for attaining an object of interest [5]. Furthermore, PPS displays flexible boundaries that are sensitive to motor action factors [6,7] as well as to affective components [8,9], so that multisensory integration related to the body can be adaptively boosted according to the context.…”

Spinal cord lesions shrink peripersonal space around the feet, passive mobilization of paraplegic limbs restores it

“…the region of space within which objects can be grasped and manipulated) is known as the Peripersonal space (PPS). Electrophysiological experiments on monkeys and neuropsychological and neuroimaging studies on humans (for a review see 1 ) showed that there are complex neuronal networks in premotor, parietal and subcortical brain regions underlying PPS 2 3 4 5 6 7 . A fast, automatic integration of various different sensory and motor signals within the PPS is guaranteed by multisensory bimodal neurons (e.g.…”