Interplay between cerebral and muscular activations during motor tasks: An fNIRS-sEMG study

Understanding the intricate relationship between brain activations and muscle activations during motor tasks is crucial for elucidating motor control mechanisms and designing effective rehabilitation strategies. In this study, we investigated this relationship using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) and surface electromyography (sEMG) technologies. Three healthy male subjects performed lower-limb motor tasks while their brain activations and muscle activations were recorded simultaneously. The fNIRS data were converted to optical densities and filtered by lowpass filter, detrending, and short-separation regression to remove artifacts. The filtered signals were fed to a general linear model with the desired hemodynamic responses (dHRFs) constructed with Balloon model and simulated physiological noises reconstructed with the parameters obtained from the spectrum analysis of baseline signals. Despite the extracted hemodynamic responses from fNIRS data, sEMG signals were lowpass and analyzed to detect muscle activations. Results revealed that cerebral activations during lateral leg flexion tasks were similar yet only partially consistent with those observed in stand-up tasks. Significant correlations between brain and muscle activations were also observed, highlighting the complex interplay between central and peripheral neural mechanisms during motor control. These findings provide valuable insights into the neural basis of motor control and have implications for developing personalized rehabilitation interventions and assistive technologies to enhance motor function in clinical populations.