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Muscles: Non-linear Transformers of Motor Neuron Activity

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Neuromechanical Modeling of Posture and Locomotion

Part of the book series: Springer Series in Computational Neuroscience ((NEUROSCI))

Abstract

Predicting movement from neural activity requires quantitative understanding of muscle response to motor neuron input. Muscles are sufficiently complicated that fulfilling this goal requires computer simulation. We therefore first explain in considerable detail one approach to modeling muscle. We then provide multiple examples of how muscle intrinsic properties and muscle diversity make straightforward predictions of how muscles transform neural input into movement impossible, including the dependence of muscle velocity on sarcomere number, the inadequacy of mean data in muscle modeling, the effects of muscle low-pass filtering, spike-number vs. spike frequency coding for contraction amplitude, how the role of passive muscle force in movement generation varies as a function of limb size, how muscles produce forces greater than their ‘maximum force’, energy conserving mechanisms, muscles that brake rather than produce movement, and how muscles can generate restoring responses (preflexes) to perturbing input in the absence of sensory feedback.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biological Sciences, Irvine Hall, 45701, Athens, OH, USA

    Scott L. Hooper PhD, Kevin H. Hobbs BS & Jeffrey B. Thuma MS

  2. Zoologisches Institut, Universität zu Köln, Zülpicher Straße 47B, 50674, Cologne, Germany

    Christoph Guschlbauer PhD, Arndt von Twickel PhD & Ansgar Büschges PhD

  3. Institut für Biologie und ihre Didaktik, Kunzenweg 21, 79117, Freiburg, Germany

    Marcus Blümel PhD

Authors
  1. Scott L. Hooper PhD
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  2. Christoph Guschlbauer PhD
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  3. Marcus Blümel PhD
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  4. Arndt von Twickel PhD
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  5. Kevin H. Hobbs BS
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  6. Jeffrey B. Thuma MS
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  7. Ansgar Büschges PhD
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Scott L. Hooper PhD .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Georgia Institute of Technology , Atlanta, Georgia, USA

    Boris I. Prilutsky

  2. Georgia State University , Atlanta, Georgia, USA

    Donald H. Edwards

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Hooper, S. et al. (2016). Muscles: Non-linear Transformers of Motor Neuron Activity. In: Prilutsky, B., Edwards, D. (eds) Neuromechanical Modeling of Posture and Locomotion. Springer Series in Computational Neuroscience. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-3267-2_6

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