Active control of bias for the control of posture and movement

Posture and movement are fundamental, intermixed components of motor coordination. Current approaches consider either that 1) movement is an active, anticipatory process and posture is a passive feedback process or 2) movement and posture result from a common passive process. In both cases, the presence of a passive component renders control scarcely robust and stable in the face of transmission delays and low feedback gains. Here we show in a model that posture and movement could result from the same active process: an optimal feedback control that drives the body from its estimated state to its goal in a given (planning) time by acting through muscles on the insertion position (bias) of compliant linkages (tendons). Computer simulations show that iteration of this process in the presence of noise indifferently produces realistic postural sway, fast goal-directed movements, and natural transitions between posture and movement.