Human basal ganglia and the dynamic control of force during on-line corrections

Natural movements are corrected in part by the generation of submovements, occurring early in a movement such that they amend an ongoing action. Submovements are associated with activity of the basal ganglia, implying a role for the structures in error correction. In parallel, the basal ganglia are linked to the generation and control of force amplitude, change, and duration. Here, we tested whether activity in human basal ganglia is associated with submovements generally, or was specific to a condition where the submovements only occurred in the face of unexpected proprioceptive error. Submovements were induced by introducing unexpected and variable viscous loads (augmenting the need for trial-specific grip forces) or by reducing target size (augmenting the need for visually guided on-line control) in a one-dimensional target-capture task. In both cases, subjects compensated for the increased task difficulty by generating corrective submovements, which were closely matched in frequency and type. Activity in the internal segment of the globus pallidus and subthalamic nucleus correlated strongly with the number of submovements during the viscous challenge but not with the target challenge. The effects could not be explained by kinematic differences, i.e., movement amplitude or average number of submovements. The results support a specific role for the basal ganglia in error correction under conditions of variable load where there is a need for the dynamic control of force within an ongoing movement.