title: Cursive writing with smooth pursuit eye movements.
abstract: The eyes never cease to move: ballistic saccades quickly turn the gaze toward peripheral targets, whereas smooth pursuit maintains moving targets on the fovea where visual acuity is best. Despite the oculomotor system being endowed with exquisite motor abilities, any attempt to generate smooth eye movements against a static background results in saccadic eye movements. Although exceptions to this rule have been reported, volitional control over smooth eye movements is at best rudimentary. Here, I introduce a novel, temporally modulated visual display, which, although static, sustains smooth eye movements in arbitrary directions. After brief training, participants gain volitional control over smooth pursuit eye movements and can generate digits, letters, words, or drawings at will. For persons deprived of limb movement, this offers a fast, creative, and personal means of linguistic and emotional expression.
authors: Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Centre de Recherche de l'Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle épinière, CNRS UMR-7225, Inserm UMR S975, GH Pitié-Salpêtrière - Bâtiment ICM, 47 Bld de l'Hôpital, 75651 Paris Cedex 13, France. jean.lorenceau@upmc.fr
authors: Jean
authors: J
authors: Lorenceau
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D006233:Persons with Disabilities / Q000534:rehabilitation; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011698:Pursuit, Smooth; D012046:Rehabilitation / Q000379:methods*; D014956:Writing; D055815:Young Adult