2004 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
Functional roles of the prefrontal cortex in updating behavioral rules
| Project/Area Number |
15500281
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
Neurophysiology and muscle physiology
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| Research Institution | Tohoku University |
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Principal Investigator |
MUSHIAKE Hajime Tohoku University, Graduate school of Medicine, Associate Professor, 大学院・医学系研究科, 助教授 (80219849)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2003 – 2004
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| Keywords | prefrontal cortex / rule / goal |
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| Research Abstract |
To investigate the involvement of the prefrontal cortex in multi-step behavioral planning, we recorded neuronal activity from the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex while a monkey performed a path-planning task, which required planning of multiple steps of cursor movements to reach goals. A trial began when the animal held two manipulanda given for each arm, at each holding position. Then a cursor was presented in a maze. One second later a goal was presented in the maze for 1s and then turned off. One second later, an obstacle was presented. Then after a further delay of 1s, a GO-signal was given to the monkey and then the monkey was required to move the cursor to the instructed goal by controlling the two manipulanda. To dissociate hand-movements and cursor-directions, we trained the monkey to perform this task with 3 different hand-cursor assignments or rules.
Neuronal activity was recorded from the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. In this study, we analyzed neuronal activity during the d
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elay period before the GO-signal to know whether the PF neurons reflected forthcoming hand movements or cursor directions. Among PF neurons with pre-GO activity, a majority of PF neurons showed activity related to forthcoming cursor directions. Some PF neurons showed activity changes related to the first cursor direction. Another PF neurons showed activity changes selectively for a final goal. In contrast, only a small number of PF neurons reflected the choice of hand movements. Our data demonstrated that the prefrontal cortex is involved in planning cursor directions or the outcome of hand movements, rather than planning the movement itself. The immediate and final behavioral was the decisive factor that influence neuronal activity during the delay period rather than the motor attributes of the forthcoming action. Our data suggest that the prefrontal cortex is involved in representation of final goal in prospective memory and transformation from final goal to immediate sub-goal rather than sensorimotor transformation. Less
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Research Products
(6 results)
