Tapping Into the Language of Touch: Using Non-invasive Stimulation to Specify Tactile Afferent Firing Patterns

Frontiers in Neuroscience

Sarah McIntyre¹  Saad S. Nagi¹  Mohit N. Shivdasani²  Ingvars Birznieks³  Richard M. Vickery³  Kevin K. W. Ng³  Jason R. Potas⁴ 

[1] Center for Social and Affective Neuroscience, Department of Biomedical and Clinical Sciences, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden;Graduate School of Biomedical Engineering, UNSW Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia;Neuroscience Research Australia, Sydney, NSW, Australia;School of Medical Sciences, UNSW Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia;

关键词: bionic;    tactile;    neural prosthesis;    brain-machine interface;    somatosensory;    spike train;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fnins.2020.00500

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

The temporal pattern of action potentials can convey rich information in a variety of sensory systems. We describe a new non-invasive technique that enables precise, reliable generation of action potential patterns in tactile peripheral afferent neurons by brief taps on the skin. Using this technique, we demonstrate sophisticated coding of temporal information in the somatosensory system, that shows that perceived vibration frequency is not encoded in peripheral afferents as was expected by either their firing rate or the underlying periodicity of the stimulus. Instead, a burst gap or silent gap between trains of action potentials conveys frequency information. This opens the possibility of new encoding strategies that could be deployed to convey sensory information using mechanical or electrical stimulation in neural prostheses and brain-machine interfaces, and may extend to senses beyond artificial encoding of aspects of touch. We argue that a focus on appropriate use of effective temporal coding offers more prospects for rapid improvement in the function of these interfaces than attempts to scale-up existing devices.

【 授权许可】

Unknown