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The Journal of Neurophysiology Vol. 83 No. 1 January 2000, pp. 232-259
Copyright ©2000 by the American Physiological Society
Department of Physiology and Biophysics and Fishberg Research Center for Neurobiology, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, New York 10029
Brezina, Vladimir and
Klaudiusz R. Weiss.
The Neuromuscular Transform Constrains the Production of
Functional Rhythmic Behaviors. J. Neurophysiol. 83: 232-259, 2000. We continue our study of the properties
and the functional role of the neuromuscular transform (NMT). The NMT
is an input-output relation that formalizes the processes by which
patterns of motor neuron firing are transformed to muscle contractions.
Because the NMT acts as a dynamic, nonlinear, and modifiable filter,
the transformation is complex. In the preceding paper we developed a
framework for analysis of the NMT and identified with it principles by
which the NMT transforms different firing patterns to contractions. The
ultimate question is functional, however. In sending different firing
patterns through the NMT, the nervous system is seeking to command
different functional behaviors, with specific contraction requirements.
To what extent do the contractions that emerge from the NMT actually
satisfy those requirements? In this paper we extend our analysis to
address this issue. We define representative behavioral tasks and
corresponding measures of performance, for a single neuromuscular unit,
for two antagonistic units, and, in a real illustration, for the
accessory radula closer (ARC)-opener neuromuscular system of
Aplysia. We focus on cyclical, rhythmic behaviors which
reveal the underlying principles particularly clearly. We find that,
although every pattern of motor neuron firing produces some state of
muscle contraction, only a few patterns produce functional behavior,
and even fewer produce efficient functional behavior. The functional
requirements thus dictate certain patterns to the nervous system. But
many desirable functional behaviors are not possible with any pattern.
We examine, in particular, how rhythmic behaviors degrade and
disintegrate as the nervous system attempts to speed up their cycle
frequency. This happens because, with fixed properties, the NMT
produces only a limited range of contraction shapes that are
kinetically well matched to the firing pattern only on certain time
scales. Thus the properties of the NMT constrain and restrict the
production of functional behaviors. In the following paper, we see how
the constraint may be alleviated and the range of functional behaviors
expanded by appropriately tuning the properties of the NMT through
neuromuscular plasticity and modulation.
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