title: On-beam synchrony in the cerebellum as the mechanism for the timing and coordination of movement.
abstract: In trained reaching rats, we recorded simple spikes of pairs of Purkinje cells that, with respect to each other, were either aligned on a beam of shared parallel fibers or instead were located off beam. Rates of simple spike firing in both on-beam and off-beam Purkinje cell pairs commonly showed great variety in depth of modulation during reaching behavior. But with respect to timing, on-beam Purkinje cell pairs had simple spikes that were tightly time-locked to each other (either delayed or simultaneous) and to movement, despite the variability in rate. By contrast, off-beam Purkinje cell pairs had simple spikes that were not time-locked to each other, neither delayed nor simultaneous. We discuss the implications of these observations for the cerebellar role in timing and coordinating movement.
authors: Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, TN 38103, USA.
authors: D H
authors: DH
authors: Heck
authors: W T
authors: WT
authors: Thach
authors: J G
authors: JG
authors: Keating
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D002531:Cerebellum / Q000502:physiology*; D009068:Movement / Q000502:physiology*; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D013997:Time Factors