Sg. Kim et al., FUNCTIONAL MRI OF HUMAN MOTOR CORTICES DURING OVERT AND IMAGINED FINGER MOVEMENTS, International journal of imaging systems and technology, 6(2-3), 1995, pp. 271
A T-2-weighted echo-planar imaging technique at 4T was employed to pr
oduce functional maps of the human motor cortices during overt and ima
gined movements. Tasks required subjects either to perform or imagine
a visually cued sequence of digit-to-thumb oppositions. The following
significant functional changes were observed: 1) Contralateral primary
motor cortex showed attenuated activity during the imagined tasks; 2)
bilateral supplementary motor area and premotor cortices were active
during both the visually instructed movements and the imagined finger
movements; and 3) superior parietal cortex showed varying degrees of a
ctivation in subjects performing the movement and imagined tasks. In p
reliminary data, task-related activation of the primary motor cortex d
uring imagined finger movements was observed in all subjects, suggesti
ng that the motor cortex may indeed have ''premotor'' functions in add
ition to its classically assigned function solely as a muscle controll
er. (C) 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.