Defective cortical drive to muscle in Parkinson's disease and its improvement with levodopa.

We recorded whole-scalp magnetoencephalographic (MEG) signals simultaneously with surface electromyographic (EMG) activity from eight patients with Parkinson's disease after withdrawal and reinstatement of treatment with levodopa. Variations were seen in the coherence between the forearm extensor EMG and the MEG signal originating near or in the hand region of the primary motor cortex. As a group, the parkinsonian patients withdrawn from levodopa showed a reduction in the coherence at 15-30 Hz and 35-60 Hz, and a further three untreated patients had abnormally strong MEG-EMG coherence at 5-12 Hz compared with when medicated or with eight healthy age-matched control subjects. We conclude that the basal ganglia have a specific effect on the temporal organization of motor cortical activity during voluntary tonic contraction. Abnormalities in this aspect of basal ganglia function may directly contribute to bradykinesia and weakness in Parkinson's disease.

[1]  T. J. Putnam,et al.  ACTION POTENTIALS OF MUSCLES IN RIGIDITY AND TREMOR , 1940 .

[2]  R. Schwab,et al.  Action tremor and the cogwheel phenomenon in Parkinson's disease. , 1963, Brain : a journal of neurology.

[3]  R. Hassler,et al.  Arrest reaction, delayed inhibition and unusual gaze behavior resulting from stimulation of the putamen in awake, unrestrained cats. , 1967, Brain research.

[4]  A. Pletscher,et al.  Cerebral accumulation and metabolism of C14-dopa after selective inhibition of peripheral decarboxylase. , 1968, The Journal of pharmacology and experimental therapeutics.

[5]  Gerhard Dieckmann Cortical synchronized and desynchronized responses evoked by stimulation of the putamen and pallidum in cats. , 1968, Journal of the neurological sciences.

[6]  H. Teräväinen,et al.  Action tremor in Parkinson's disease. , 1980, Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry.

[7]  Y. Agid,et al.  Reduction of cortical dopamine, noradrenaline, serotonin and their metabolites in Parkinson's disease , 1983, Brain Research.

[8]  G. Eklund,et al.  The Piper rhythm--a phenomenon related to muscle resonance characteristics? , 1983, Acta physiologica Scandinavica.

[9]  C. Marsden,et al.  Performance of simultaneous movements in patients with Parkinson's disease. , 1986, Brain : a journal of neurology.

[10]  C. Marsden,et al.  Disturbance of sequential movements in patients with Parkinson's disease. , 1987, Brain : a journal of neurology.

[11]  J. R. Rosenberg,et al.  The Fourier approach to the identification of functional coupling between neuronal spike trains. , 1989, Progress in biophysics and molecular biology.

[12]  M. Delong,et al.  Primate models of movement disorders of basal ganglia origin , 1990, Trends in Neurosciences.

[13]  G. E. Alexander,et al.  Basal ganglia-thalamocortical circuits: parallel substrates for motor, oculomotor, "prefrontal" and "limbic" functions. , 1990, Progress in brain research.

[14]  M. Shindo,et al.  Muscular weakness in Parkinson's disease. , 1990, Advances in neurology.

[15]  B. Berger,et al.  Alterations of dopaminergic and noradrenergic innervations in motor cortex in parkinson's disease , 1991, Annals of neurology.

[16]  L. Tremblay,et al.  Abnormal spontaneous activity of globus pallidus neurons in monkeys with MPTP-induced parkinsonism , 1991, Brain Research.

[17]  H. Freund,et al.  Does tremor pace repetitive voluntary motor behavior in parkinson's disease? , 1991, Annals of neurology.

[18]  D. Paré,et al.  Fast oscillations (20-40 Hz) in thalamocortical systems and their potentiation by mesopontine cholinergic nuclei in the cat. , 1991, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[19]  S. Fleminger Control of simultaneous movements distinguishes depressive motor retardation from Parkinson's disease and neuroleptic parkinsonism. , 1992, Brain : a journal of neurology.

[20]  D. Halliday,et al.  The frequency content of common synaptic inputs to motoneurones studied during voluntary isometric contraction in man. , 1993, The Journal of physiology.

[21]  R. Ilmoniemi,et al.  Magnetoencephalography-theory, instrumentation, and applications to noninvasive studies of the working human brain , 1993 .

[22]  L. Parkkonen,et al.  122-channel squid instrument for investigating the magnetic signals from the human brain , 1993 .

[23]  T. Sejnowski,et al.  Thalamocortical oscillations in the sleeping and aroused brain. , 1993, Science.

[24]  H. Bergman,et al.  The primate subthalamic nucleus. II. Neuronal activity in the MPTP model of parkinsonism. , 1994, Journal of neurophysiology.

[25]  J. Mattingley,et al.  Reduction in external cues and movement sequencing in Parkinson's disease. , 1994, Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry.

[26]  O. Devinsky,et al.  Neurophysiological properties of pallidal neurons in Parkinson's disease , 1994, Annals of neurology.

[27]  C. Nordling,et al.  Wavelengths and energy levels of the 4d95s-4d95p transition array of Xe IX , 1994 .

[28]  B. Conway,et al.  Synchronization between motor cortex and spinal motoneuronal pool during the performance of a maintained motor task in man. , 1995, The Journal of physiology.

[29]  H. Bergman,et al.  Neurons in the globus pallidus do not show correlated activity in the normal monkey, but phase-locked oscillations appear in the MPTP model of parkinsonism. , 1995, Journal of neurophysiology.

[30]  G. Pfurtscheller,et al.  Human cortical 40 Hz rhythm is closely related to EMG rhythmicity , 1996, Neuroscience Letters.

[31]  J. Rothwell,et al.  Strength in Parkinson's disease: Relationshp to rate of force generation and clinical status , 1996, Annals of neurology.

[32]  R. Llinás,et al.  Central motor loop oscillations in parkinsonian resting tremor revealed magnetoencephalography , 1996, Neurology.

[33]  P. Brown,et al.  Muscle sounds in Parkinson's disease , 1997, The Lancet.

[34]  J. Dostrovsky,et al.  Effects of apomorphine on globus pallidus neurons in parkinsonian patients , 1997, Annals of neurology.

[35]  R. Hari,et al.  Cortical control of human motoneuron firing during isometric contraction. , 1997, Journal of neurophysiology.

[36]  J. Rothwell,et al.  Does parkinsonian action tremor contribute to muscle weakness in Parkinson's disease? , 1997, Brain : a journal of neurology.

[37]  C. Marsden,et al.  Frequency peaks of tremor, muscle vibration and electromyographic activity at 10 Hz, 20 Hz and 40 Hz during human finger muscle contraction may reflect rhythmicities of central neural firing , 1997, Experimental Brain Research.

[38]  C. Marsden,et al.  What do the basal ganglia do? , 1998, The Lancet.

[39]  J. Rothwell,et al.  Cortical correlate of the Piper rhythm in humans. , 1998, Journal of neurophysiology.

[40]  R. J. Allan,et al.  Neurophysiological identification of the subthalamic nucleus in surgery for Parkinson's disease , 1998, Annals of neurology.

[41]  M. Merello,et al.  Apomorphine induces changes in GPi spontaneous outflow in patients with parkinson's disease , 1999, Movement disorders : official journal of the Movement Disorder Society.

[42]  J. Rothwell,et al.  Impact of deep brain stimulation on upper limb akinesia in Parkinson's disease , 1999, Annals of neurology.

[43]  C. Marsden,et al.  Bradykinesia and impairment of EEG desynchronization in Parkinson's disease , 1999, Movement disorders : official journal of the Movement Disorder Society.

[44]  T. Naidich,et al.  Diffuse meningeal enhancement in patients with overdraining, long-standing ventricular shunts , 1999, Neurology.

[45]  J. R. Rosenberg,et al.  Load-independent contributions from motor-unit synchronization to human physiological tremor. , 1999, Journal of neurophysiology.

[46]  M. Hallett,et al.  Force level modulates human cortical oscillatory activities , 1999, Neuroscience Letters.

[47]  A. Vighetto,et al.  A selective imaging of tinnitus. , 1999, Neuroreport.

[48]  R. Hari,et al.  Rhythmical corticomotor communication. , 1999, Neuroreport.

[49]  P. Strick,et al.  The Organization of Cerebellar and Basal Ganglia Outputs to Primary Motor Cortex as Revealed by Retrograde Transneuronal Transport of Herpes Simplex Virus Type 1 , 1999, The Journal of Neuroscience.

[50]  P. Brown,et al.  Impairment of EEG desynchronisation before and during movement and its relation to bradykinesia in Parkinson’s disease , 1999, Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry.

[51]  R. Kristeva-Feige,et al.  Tremor-correlated cortical activity detected by electroencephalography , 2000, Clinical Neurophysiology.

[52]  P. Brown Cortical drives to human muscle: the Piper and related rhythms , 2000, Progress in Neurobiology.

[53]  U. Shahani,et al.  Coherence between low-frequency activation of the motor cortex and tremor in patients with essential tremor , 2000, The Lancet.

[54]  G. Stelmach,et al.  Force production characteristics in Parkinson's disease , 1989, Experimental Brain Research.