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Intermuscular coherence contributions in synergistic muscles during pedaling

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Abstract

The execution of rhythmical motor tasks requires the control of multiple skeletal muscles by the Central Nervous System (CNS), and the neural mechanisms according to which the CNS manages their coordination are not completely clear yet. In this study, we analyze the distribution of the neural drive shared across muscles that work synergistically during the execution of a free pedaling task. Electromyographic (EMG) activity was recorded from eight lower limb muscles of eleven healthy untrained participants during an unconstrained pedaling exercise. The coordinated activity of the lower limb muscles was described within the framework of muscle synergies, extracted through the application of nonnegative matrix factorization. Intermuscular synchronization was assessed by calculating intermuscular coherence between pairs of EMG signals from co-active, both synergistic and non-synergistic muscles within their periods of co-activation. The spatiotemporal structure of muscle coordination during pedaling was well represented by four muscle synergies for all the subjects. Significant coherence values within the gamma band (30–60 Hz) were identified only for one out of the four extracted muscle synergies. This synergy is mainly composed of the activity of knee extensor muscles, and its function is related to the power production and crank propelling during the pedaling cycle. In addition, a significant coherence peak was found in the lower frequencies for the GAM/SOL muscle pair, possibly related to the ankle stabilizing function of these two muscles during the pedaling task. No synchronization was found either for the other extracted muscle synergies or for pairs of co-active but non-synergistic muscles. The obtained results seem to suggest the presence of intermuscular synchronization only when a functional force production is required, with the observed gamma band contribution possibly reflecting a cortical drive to synergistic muscles during pedaling.

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We declare that we have no conflict of interest with the present manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Biomedical Engineering Laboratory, Department of Engineering, Roma TRE University, Via Vito Volterra 62, 00146, Rome, Italy

    Cristiano De Marchis, Maurizio Schmid & Silvia Conforto

  2. Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02114, USA

    Giacomo Severini

  3. Department of Neurorehabilitation Engineering, Bernstein Focus Neurotechnology, Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience, Georg-August University Göttingen, Universitätsmedizin Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany

    Anna Margherita Castronovo

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  1. Cristiano De Marchis
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  2. Giacomo Severini
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  3. Anna Margherita Castronovo
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  4. Maurizio Schmid
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  5. Silvia Conforto
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Correspondence to Cristiano De Marchis.

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De Marchis, C., Severini, G., Castronovo, A.M. et al. Intermuscular coherence contributions in synergistic muscles during pedaling. Exp Brain Res 233, 1907–1919 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-015-4262-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-015-4262-4

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