Deans' stroke musings: Watching object related movements modulates mirror-like activity in parietal brain regions

Changing stroke rehab and research worldwide now.Time is Brain! trillions and trillions of neurons that DIE each day because there are NO effective hyperacute therapies besides tPA(only 12% effective). I have 523 posts on hyperacute therapy, enough for researchers to spend decades proving them out. These are my personal ideas and blog on stroke rehabilitation and stroke research. Do not attempt any of these without checking with your medical provider. Unless you join me in agitating, when you need these therapies they won't be there.

What this blog is for:

My blog is not to help survivors recover, it is to have the 10 million yearly stroke survivors light fires underneath their doctors, stroke hospitals and stroke researchers to get stroke solved. 100% recovery. The stroke medical world is completely failing at that goal, they don't even have it as a goal. Shortly after getting out of the hospital and getting NO information on the process or protocols of stroke rehabilitation and recovery I started searching on the internet and found that no other survivor received useful information. This is an attempt to cover all stroke rehabilitation information that should be readily available to survivors so they can talk with informed knowledge to their medical staff. It lays out what needs to be done to get stroke survivors closer to 100% recovery. It's quite disgusting that this information is not available from every stroke association and doctors group.

Saturday, March 30, 2013

Watching object related movements modulates mirror-like activity in parietal brain regions

More proof of action observation. See how long before your doctor and therapists give you stroke protocols based upon this. 10-20 years I bet. No self-prescribing, you know how dangerous it is watching videos of muscle movement.
http://www.clinph-journal.com/article/S1388-2457%2813%2900120-X/abstract

Highlights

•The observation of goal-directed movements leads to stronger event-related desynchronization (ERD) in alpha, beta and gamma frequency bands over parietal compared to central brain regions.

•Both the type of grasping and the type of object induced an ERS over sensorimotor areas in the upper alpha and lower beta band, respectively.

•Beside the often cited MNS linked mu rhythm there is further cortical rhythmicity over parietal sites, which might be part of an “extended” human MNS.

Abstract

Objective

We studied the activation of cortical motor and parietal areas during the observation of object related grasping movements. By manipulating the type of an object (realistic versus abstract) and the type of grasping (correct versus incorrect), we addressed the question how observing such object related movements influences cortical rhythmicity, especially the mu-rhythm, in the context of an “extended” human mirror neuron system (MNS).

Methods

Multichannel electroencephalogram (EEG) was recorded during the observation of different object-related grasping actions in twenty healthy subjects. Different movies were presented, showing sequences of correct or incorrect hand grasping actions related to an abstract or realistic (daily life) object.

Results

Event-related de/synchronization (ERD/ERS) analyses revealed a larger ERD in the upper alpha (10–12

Hz), beta (16–20

Hz) and gamma (36–40

Hz) frequency bands over parietal brain regions depending on the type of grasping. The type of object only influenced ERD patterns in the gamma band range (36–40

Hz) at parietal sites suggesting a strong relation of gamma band activity and cortical object representation. Abstract and realistic objects produced lower beta band synchronization at central sites only, whereas depending on the type of grasping an ERS in the upper alpha band (10–12

Hz) was observed.

Conclusion

Depending on the type of the grasped object and the type of grasping stronger parietal cortical activation occurred during movement observation.

Significance

Discussing the results in terms of an “extended” human mirror neuron system (MNS), it could be concluded that beside sensorimotor areas a stronger involvement of parietal brain regions was found depending on the type of object and grasping movement observed.

Deans' stroke musings