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Somatosensation

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The somatosensory system relays sensory information from the skin, mucous membranes, limbs, and joints. Somatosensation is more familiarly known as the sense of touch. A typical somatosensory pathway includes three types of long neurons: primary, secondary, and tertiary. Primary neurons have cell bodies located near the spinal cord in groups of neurons called dorsal root ganglia. The sensory neurons of ganglia innervate designated areas of skin called dermatomes.

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The somatosensory cortex in the parietal lobes is crucial for interpreting sensory data such as touch, temperature, and proprioception. The somatosensory cortex, situated in the parietal lobes, plays a vital role in interpreting sensory information like touch, temperature, and proprioception—awareness of body position. This specialized brain region features an organized structure wherein neurons at the top primarily process sensations originating from the lower body. In contrast, those at the...

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jul 4, 2026

Compensatory Limb Use and Behavioral Assessment of Motor Skill Learning Following Sensorimotor Cortex Injury in a Mouse Model of Ischemic Stroke

Compensatory Limb Use and Behavioral Assessment of Motor Skill Learning Following Sensorimotor Cortex Injury in a Mouse Model of Ischemic Stroke

Published on: July 10, 2014

Limb-specific representation for reaching in the posterior parietal cortex.

Steve W C Chang¹, Anthony R Dickinson, Lawrence H Snyder

¹Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, Missouri 63110, USA. steve@eye-hand.wustl.edu

The Journal of Neuroscience : the Official Journal of the Society for Neuroscience

|June 14, 2008

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

The posterior parietal cortex

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Compensatory Limb Use and Behavioral Assessment of Motor Skill Learning Following Sensorimotor Cortex Injury in a Mouse Model of Ischemic Stroke

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Area of Science:

Neuroscience
Motor Control
Cognitive Neuroscience

Background:

The posterior parietal cortex (PPC) is crucial for visually guided reaching.
Neuronal activity in the PPC, specifically the parietal reach region (PRR), represents target locations for reaching movements.
It remains unclear whether these neural representations are limb-specific or limb-independent.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate whether neuronal representations of target locations in the PRR are dependent on the limb used for reaching.
To determine the extent of limb specificity in PRR neuronal activity during reaching tasks.

Main Methods:

Electrophysiological recordings were performed in the PRR of subjects performing reaching movements.
Neuronal responses were analyzed to assess target representation for both contralateral and ipsilateral limbs.
Reaction times for contralateral and ipsilateral limb movements were correlated with neuronal firing rates.

Main Results:

A continuum of neuronal responses was observed, with some neurons showing limb-independent target representations and others showing limb-dependent representations.
A majority of neurons represented contralateral-limb targets, with only a few representing ipsilateral-limb targets.
Neuronal firing rates were significantly correlated with contralateral-limb reaction times but not ipsilateral-limb reaction times.

Conclusions:

The PRR plays a limb-dependent role in the sensory-motor transformation for visually guided reaching.
The PRR appears to be more involved in planning and executing contralateral limb movements than ipsilateral movements.
These findings suggest a more specialized function for the PRR in motor control than previously understood.