David A. Leopold is in the Section on Cognitive Neurophysiology and Imaging, National Institute of Mental Health, Bethseda, Maryland 20814, USA. In the 1930s, the neurosurgeon Wilder Penfield ...

Compared to other animal species, humans can plan and execute highly sophisticated motor tasks, including the ability to write complex characters using their hands. While many past studies have tried ...

Neurons in the brain's motor cortex previously thought of as active mainly during hand and arm movements also light up during speech in a way that is similar to patterns of brain activity linked to ...

The motor cortex homunculus is getting a makeover. New research has essentially redrawn the motor cortex and constitutes one of the most substantial shifts in our topographical knowledge of a sensory ...

Researchers have discovered that the dorsal premotor cortex serves a 'meta-learning' function, overseeing and regulating physical movements. Once believed to be limited to movement planning, this ...

The classical view of how the human brain controls voluntary movement might not tell the whole story. That map of the primary motor cortex — the motor homunculus — shows how this brain region is ...

Scientists have discovered that signals in the motor cortex act like a series of clutches when it comes to moving, and that these signals can be disrupted to slow the brain's initiation of movement.

Scientists found evidence of two interleaved systems, which may help explain the connection between what's going on in our bodies and what's going on in brain areas involved in thoughts and emotions.

Optogenetics is a recently developed technique that can control cellular functions by illuminating lights to the cells in which light-sensitive proteins are expressed by gene transfer. Optogenetics ...

Kung, jak, kungjak.” Elderly hands move to the drumbeat, and their toes keep time. Eyes closed, they feel the rhythm, ...