HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS		QUICK SEARCH:   [advanced] Author: Keyword(s): Year:  Vol:  Page:

This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) All Versions of this Article: 99/2/773    most recent 01001.2007v1 Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in ISI Web of Science Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Google Scholar Articles by Murata, Y. Articles by Yamane, S. PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Murata, Y. Articles by Yamane, S.

Effects of Motor Training on the Recovery of Manual Dexterity After Primary Motor Cortex Lesion in Macaque Monkeys

¹Neuroscience Research Institute, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST); ²Graduate School of Comprehensive Human Science, University of Tsukuba, Ibaraki; ³Core Research for Evolutional Science and Technology (CREST), Japan Science and Technology Agency, Saitama; ⁴Department of Cellular and Molecular Biology, Primate Research Institute, Kyoto University, Aichi; ⁵Division of Applied System Neuroscience, Advanced Medical Science Course, Nihon University School of Medicine, Tokyo; and ⁶Maebashi Institute of Technology, Gunma, Japan

Submitted 8 September 2007; accepted in final form 19 December 2007

To investigate the effects of postlesion training on motor recovery, we compared the motor recovery of macaque monkeys that had received intensive motor training with those that received no training after a lesion of the primary motor cortex (M1). An ibotenic acid lesion in the M1 digit area resulted in impairment of hand function, with complete loss of digit movement. In the monkeys that had undergone intensive daily training (1 h/day, 5 days/wk) after the lesion, behavioral indexes used to evaluate manual dexterity recovered to the same level as in the prelesion period after 1 or 2 mo of postlesion training period. Relatively independent digit movements, including precision grip (prehension of a small object with finger-to-thumb opposition), were restored in the trained monkeys. Although the behavioral indexes of manual dexterity recovered to some extent in the monkeys without the postlesion training, they remained lower than those in the prelesion period until several months after M1 lesion. The untrained monkeys frequently used alternate grip strategies to grasp a small object with the affected hand, holding food pellets between the tip of the index finger and the dorsum of the thumb. These results suggest that the recovery after M1 lesion includes both use-dependent and use-independent processes and that the recovery of precision grip can be promoted by intensive use of the affected hand in postlesion training.