Motor Control

Paulina Seminova
Movements are simple reflexes with brief muscle activation (eyeblink,
hiccup, finger twitch)
Acts, or action patterns, are complex, sequential movements (honking
your car horn, writing your name, playing lead guitar)
A motor plan, or motor program, is a set of muscle commands
established before the action occurs

Most of the brain’s activity is ultimately motoric; preparing to move,

moving, correcting movement

The only reason we need a brain at all is to move. So the whole point
of our brain is guide movement. The rest is just fluff.
 Two control mechanisms optimize accuracy and speed

Open-loop control maximizes speed:

No guiding external feedback
Ballistic movements are rapid – completed no matter what sensory feedback
is received
 Two control mechanisms optimize accuracy and speed
Closed-loop control maximizes accuracy – information from what is being
controlled flows back to the controlling device
Ramp movements (smooth movements) are slower, sustained motions guided
by feedback

Driver texting
 Hierarchy of motor control systems
• Skeletal system and muscles power • Brainstem integrates motor commands
movement
• Primary motor cortex initiates
• Spinal cord controls skeletal muscles commands for action
• Nonprimary motor cortex initiates
cortical processing
• Cerebellum and basal ganglia tweak
these systems
Muscles that contract when others extend are antagonists
Muscles that act together are synergists

• At rest, flexor and extensor muscles are balanced

• Tremor is alternation of flexor-extensor contraction
Normally present, but if poorly regulated it is debilitating

Biceps and triceps are

antagonists
A muscle is composed of muscle fibers – each fiber contains two kinds of regularly
arranged, overlapping filaments:

Thick filaments: myosin

Thin filaments: actin

Contraction shortens the fiber length

 Recruitment of Muscle Fibers
Striated muscle - voluntary – two types of fibers:
Fast-twitch and slow-twitch muscle fibers

• Slow-twitch fibers contract slowly but resist fatigue. First to be recruited

• Fast-twitch fibers contract rapidly but fatigue easily . So the last to be recruited
Motoneurons send their axons to innervate muscles
Action potentials travel down the motoneuron, which branches
into many terminals near its target

.
Motoneurons and Neuromuscular Junctions

Neuromuscular junction – motor neuron

terminal and muscle fiber meet

Acetylcholine (ACh) is released

 Motor units

Motor unit is one motoneuron’s axon and all of its

target fibers
Muscles that make fine, precise movements have
only a few muscle fibers per axon
Innervation ratio:
1/3

Innervation ratio:
Try texting with your elbows 1/13
 Action of muscles is guided by sensory feedback

Proprioception is the collection of information about body movements and

position (how Tiger knows when to start his downswing)

Two kinds of muscle proprioceptive receptors:

• Muscle spindles – responsive to muscle stretch
• Golgi tendon organs - respond to muscle contraction, less to stretch
Muscle spindle
If a muscle is stretched,
muscle spindle also stretches.
Afferent nerve impulses
inform spinal cord of the
stretch. Muscle contracts to
maintain ‘preset’ length

Stimulation of Golgi tendon

organs inhibits motoneurons,
thereby relaxing extreme
tension and preventing
damage
Stretch Reflex Circuit – summary

1. Muscle is stretched

2. Excitation of muscle
spindle afferents

3. Excitation of
motoneurons

4. Agonist muscle
stimulated to oppose
stretch

5. Antagonist muscle is
inhibited

This is why you don’t fall over when you

extend your arm. Can you see why?
 Spasticity
impaired control of the stretch reflex

• Motor cortex normally keeps a tight rein (inhibition) on reflex behavior, so

reflexes don't interfere with voluntary movements
• When normal cortex input is cut off, spinal cord becomes hyperreflexic: normal
reflexes are exaggerated – as in clonus

clonus hyperreflexia
 Pyramidal vs. Extrapyramidal motor systems

pyramidal extrapyramidal
Pyramidal System Pathway –
a two neuron chain

Neuron 1)
From primary motor
cortex to pyramid in
the medulla, where it
crosses over, then
down spinal cord to
end at anterior horn
cell (motoneuron)

Neuron 2)
From motoneuron to
muscle
 Primary motor cortex (M1)

Primary motor cortex changes as a result of learning:

Early music training results in expansion of motor cortex
 Nonprimary motor cortex is just anterior to M1

• Supplementary motor area (SMA) – encodes sequences of movements

• Premotor cortex – neurons fire just before performing an activity

M1
Mirror neurons in premotor cortex: the same neurons fire when observing
another doing that task

Sports tips: Watch the pros

Visualize yourself in the action
Extrapyramidal system - The basal ganglia
Cerebellum cortex contains Purkinje cells, which only send inhibitory messages –
cerebellum guides movement through inhibition
Cerebellum and Basal Ganglia Modulate Movement
Primary motor cortex and basal ganglia are more involved
in early phase of a movement than SMA and cerebellum
 Voluntary movements need postural adjustment

Extrapyramidal system predicts postural

consequences of planned (pyramidal)
movement and acts to prevent loss of
balance

• Bell sounds to initiate the lift

• Gastrocnemius is activated before biceps
 Central pattern generator
neural circuit that generates rhythmic behaviors

Rhythmic activities, such as walking, are generated in

spinal cord
 Input to Output
A very long journey

A visual stimulus that requires a

choice and a button push involves:
 Movement Control Cascade

3 5
4 1

2 4

1) What is current state of the body? 4) Load the motor plan.

2) Should I move? 5) Execute the plan.
3) Select the motor plan. 6) Feedback on how the plan is going.
Change it?
Clinical Neurology of Movement
 Strength versus tone
the basics

Strength is largely a pyramidal function

• Power
Tone is largely an extrapyramidal function
• Posture

These are not independent

 Pyramidal vs. Extrapyramidal

extrapyramidal

Pyramidal damage causes Extrapyramidal damage impairs

weakness movement control
Myopathy

Primary disorder of muscle

 Muscular dystrophy – progressive
degeneration of muscle

Dystrophin is a protein needed for normal

muscle function – produced by X
chromosome

Patients make no dystrophin or an abnormal

dystrophin molecule
Myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune
disorder – patient develops antibodies
to own ACh receptors
Weakness of skeletal muscles that
develops over the day, resolves with
rest/sleep

Antibodies in purple
ptosis
 Myasthenia gravis

Tensilon (acetylcholine agonist) test

 Polio

Poliovirus destroys spinal motoneurons and

sometimes cranial motoneurons

Spinal cord with loss of motoneurons

 Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

ALS, Lou Gehrig’s disease, degeneration of

motoneurons and consequent loss of their
target muscles

Similar process happens in normal

aging

Fasciculations
 Spinal cord injuries

Spina bifida

Spinal cord injuries result in flaccid paralysis – reflexes, sensation, and

strength below level of the injury are lost
 Higher-level (motor processing) disorders

Apraxia – inability to sequence movements, though no muscle paralysis exists

Sequencing - “motor planning” disorder

New acts are ramped (feedback-controlled) - slow, variable

Well-learned acts are ballistic - fast, consistent

 Parkinson disease

• Tremor
• Bradykinesia
• Shuffling gait
• Postural instability
 Parkinson disease
A defective gene for α-synuclein – a basal ganglia
protein – is an inherited cause of Parkinson’s
Environmental exposures also contribute

Degeneration of dopamine cells in

substantia nigra, which project to the
basal ganglia
L-dopa is a precursor to dopamine; its use
reduces the symptoms
 Chorea

‘Dancing arms and hands’

 Huntington chorea
Progressive destruction of the caudate nucleus and putamen. Cerebral cortex
also is impaired
Gene responsible (HD) has a trinucleotide repeat (CAG) variable in length. If it repeats
too many times the disease develops
 Ataxia
Cerebellar damage impairs motor control
Childhood tumors of cerebellar vermis disturb
balance (ataxia)
Alcoholism causes gait ataxia; Purkinje cells die
 Dystonia (severe)

Sustained, patterned muscle contractions

• Abnormal sustained posture
• Basal ganglia dysfunction
 Tourette syndrome – Tics and Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

Basal ganglia and cortex disorder

Clinical features:
• Boys more than girls
• Tics usually end by adulthood
• Tics affect face and shoulders more
than legs
• Coprolalia is very rare
 Hemiparetic Gait

Motor cortex damage, such as stroke, causes motor impairment:

Weakness (paresis) of voluntary movements