Complementary cortical and striatal encoding of locomotor preparation and performance

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Motor Control
• Computational Neuroscience

Background:

• Cortical and striatal circuits are crucial for motor control, exhibiting similar neural dynamics.
• Direct comparisons of how these circuits encode locomotor preparation and execution are limited.

Purpose of the Study:

• To contrast neural coding properties in mouse primary motor cortex, medial prefrontal cortex, dorsolateral striatum, and dorsomedial striatum.
• To investigate the encoding of self-paced locomotion preparation and performance.

Main Methods:

• Electrophysiological recordings in awake, behaving mice during open-field locomotion.
• Population-level neural activity analysis to decode behavioral states.
• Comparison of decoding accuracy across different brain regions and behavioral epochs.

Main Results:

• All four brain areas showed cells active during both locomotion preparation and execution.
• Dorsomedial striatum demonstrated higher accuracy in encoding the preparatory period before walking.
• Primary motor cortex and dorsolateral striatum showed greater accuracy in encoding limb kinematics during walking.

Conclusions:

• Cortical and striatal circuits employ complementary coding schemes for locomotor preparation and performance.
• Distinct regional specializations exist for encoding different aspects of locomotion.
• This provides insights into the neural basis of motor control and planning.