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Development of spontaneous leg movements in infants with and without periventricular leukomalacia
J Vaal1, A J van Soest, B Hopkins
1Institute for Fundamental and Clinical Human Movement Sciences, Amsterdam/Nijmegen, Faculty of Human Movement Sciences, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. J_Vaal@fbw.vu.nl
Insights
Supraspinal influences on infant kicking emerge by 6 months. Infants with white matter damage impacting corticospinal tracts show impaired intralimb coordination, suggesting these tracts regulate joint dissociation.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Developmental Biology
- Pediatrics
Background:
- Spontaneous kicking movements in infants are crucial for motor development.
- Understanding the maturation of motor control and supraspinal influences is key to identifying developmental abnormalities.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the emergence of supraspinal influences on spontaneous infant kicking movements in the first six months of life.
- To determine if white matter (WM) damage, particularly to corticospinal tracts, affects the development of motor patterns and intralimb coordination.
Main Methods:
- Compared 3D movement data of spontaneous kicks in 19 infants with WM lesions to 10 healthy controls at 6, 12, 18, and 26 weeks corrected age.
- Utilized magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to assess the location and severity of brain lesions, specifically focusing on corticospinal tracts.
- Analyzed spatial and temporal parameters, as well as inter- and intralimb joint couplings.
Main Results:
- Infants with extensive WM lesions, especially in corticospinal tracts, exhibited decreased variability in some kick parameters.
- These infants demonstrated an impaired developmental trajectory for intralimb couplings, failing to dissociate joints at later ages.
- No significant differences were observed in interlimb couplings between groups, suggesting distinct organizational principles.
Conclusions:
- The corticospinal tracts play a significant role in regulating intralimb joint dissociation between 4 and 6 months of corrected age.
- Developmental differences in intralimb coordination observed in infants with WM lesions highlight the impact of supraspinal control.
- Findings support the hypothesis that inter- and intralimb couplings are organized through fundamentally different neural pathways.
Abstract:
The main question asked in the present study was whether support could be found for the notion that supraspinal influences on the generation of spontaneous kicking movements become increasingly apparent in the first half-year after birth. In comparing groups of infants with and without damage in tracts connected with the cortex surrounding the central sulcus, such support would consist of the finding that similar patterns of spontaneous kicking are observed early in development, whereas differences between groups should occur with increasing age. Using 3-D registrations, the spontaneous kicking movements of 19 infants with differing degrees of periventricular, lobar, and subcortical leukomalacia based on white matter (WM) abnormalities on ultrasound were compared to those of 10 healthy control infants at 6, 12, 18, and 26 weeks of corrected age. Magnetic resonance imaging recordings were used to identify the location and severity of the brain lesions. Infants with extensive lesions in the periventricular and lobar WM with or without diffuse lesions in the subcortical WM showed a decreased variability on some spatial and temporal parameters of kicks. More importantly, these infants showed a different developmental course for intralimb couplings when compared to the other infants; they were unable to dissociate tight intralimb couplings at 18 and 26 weeks. As all of these infants had substantial damage of the corticospinal tracts, these findings suggest that these tracts are involved in the regulation of intralimb joint dissociations between 4 and 6 months of age. However, caution is needed as areas outside those in which the corticospinal tracts are located could be damaged as well and most of the infants with moderate to severe lesions in the corticospinal tract had additional psychomotor problems. For interlimb couplings and most of the spatial and temporal parameters of kicks, no differences were found between groups. This strengthens the claim that inter- and intralimb couplings are organized in fundamentally different ways.