Cortical dynamics of human scalp EEG origins in a visually guided motor execution

The EEG mu rhythm is often used as an index of activation in the sensorimotor cortex. However, the blur caused by volume conduction makes it difficult to identify the exact origin of the EEG rhythm in the brain using only the human scalp EEG. In this study, simultaneous fMRI and EEG measurements were performed during a visually guided motor execution task in order to investigate whether the mu rhythm in the scalp EEG is an indication of the activity in the sensorimotor cortex. In addition, a new method was proposed for reconstruction of the cortical EEG activity through the fusion of fMRI and EEG data. A suppression of mu rhythm appeared around the lateral central electrode sites, just above the sensorimotor cortex, in association with the activity in that region. During a visually guided motor execution task, the alpha rhythms at the occipital electrode sites and the alpha rhythm at the central electrode sites also showed a correlation with the fMRI signal in the occipital and the supplementary motor cortices, respectively. This method allows the investigation of the scalp EEG origin with the spatial precision of fMRI, while retaining dynamic properties of the cortex with the temporal precision of EEG.