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1 Neurosurgery, UCSF, San Francisco, California, United States
2 Department of Neurobiology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States
3 Neurological Surgery, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California, United States
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: ChangEd{at}neurosurg.ucsf.edu.
Abnormal sensory processing has been implicated in the pathophysiology of primary dystonia. In the globus pallidus internus (GPi), the primary output structure of the basal ganglia, many neurons respond to sensory (proprioceptive) stimulation. Here, we have characterized GPi neuronal responses to passive movement of the contralateral limbs in 22 patients with primary dystonia undergoing microelectrode recording for placement of deep brain stimulator leads. We plotted coordinates of cells responding to limb movement in a common space. We observed distinct representations of leg and arm movement localized to the dorsal and ventral part of the posterior GPi, respectively. Comparing patients with generalized dystonia versus patients with segmental craniocervical dystonia, there was no difference in the volumes or separations of leg and arm related territories. In contrast to parkinsonism, only a small minority of units were responsive to movement across multiple joints. Abnormally increased directional selectivity was found in units responding to dystonic limbs compared to non-dystonic limbs. Some affected GPi neurons therefore appear to have altered proprioceptive tuning for movement direction. There is an apparent preservation of GPi somatotopic organization in dystonia, in comparison with prior studies of GPi somatotopic organization in nonhuman primates and humans with Parkinsons disease.
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