Rhythmic and discrete arm movements occur ubiquitously in everyday life, and there is a debate as to whether these two classes of movements arise from the same or different underlying neural mechanisms. Here we examine interference in a motor-learning paradigm to test whether rhythmic and discrete movements employ at least partially separate neural representations. Subjects were required to mak...

The aim of the study was to determine motor and morphological factors, and to assess their impact on specific motor skill performance in rhythmic gymnastics (RG). Experimental training process aimed at learning and improving basic movement structures of rhythmic gymnastics was performed for nine months in a sample of 50 female rhythmic gymnastics novices (mean age 7.1 +/- 0.3 years). Seven dime...

Humans perform rhythmic, locomotor movements with the arms and legs every day. Studies using reflexes to probe the functional role of the CNS suggest that spinal circuits are an important part of the neural control system for rhythmic arm cycling and walking. Here, by studying motor evoked potentials (MEPs) in response to transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) of the motor cortex, and H-reflex...

Neuroprosthetic technology has been used to restore cortical control of discrete (non-rhythmic) hand movements in a paralyzed person. However, cortical control of rhythmic movements which originate in the brain but are coordinated by Central Pattern Generator (CPG) neural networks in the spinal cord has not been demonstrated previously. Here we show a demonstration of an artificial neural bypas...

There is a tight link between the rhythm of external auditory information and movement. This can be observed when we spontaneously or deliberately move on the beat of music (e.g., dancing) or while performing physical activities (e.g., running) by listening music. Synchronization with rhythm is something natural, developed very precociously and hard-wired. In this study, we exploit this compell...

Rhythmic movement disorder, also known as jactatio capitis nocturna, is an infancy and childhood sleep-related disorder characterized by repetitive movements occurring immediately prior to sleep onset and sustained into light sleep. We report a 19-year-old man with a history of headbanging and repetitive bodyrocking since infancy, occurring on a daily basis at sleep onset. He was born a prematu...

Recent approaches towards trajectory planning for humanoid robots have divided trajectories into two categories: point-to-point and rhythmic. The former has been implemented traditionally using splines while the latter recently has been implented using mechanisms like pattern generators and neural oscillators. Researchers typically use knowledge of the task to be executed or empirical compariso...

The auditory and motor systems are strongly coupled, as is evident in the specifically tight motor synchronization that occurs in response to regularly occurring auditory cues compared with cues of other modalities. Timing of rhythmic action is known to rely on multiple neural centers including the cerebellum and the basal-ganglia which have access to both motor cortical and spinal circuitries....

Abstract This article examines the effects of Montessori music-movement activities on development rhythmic abilities 59 children from preschools, aged between 3 and 6 years. Children were deployed into two experimental groups (EG 1 (n = 20) & EG 2 22)) a control group (CG) 17). Our intervention consisted introducing 15 to 20 min unstructured movement time, either accompanied by piano 1) or ...