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Concept
Motor coordination
Summary
In physiology, motor coordination is the orchestrated movement of multiple body parts as required to accomplish intended actions, like walking. This coordination is achieved by adjusting kinematic and kinetic parameters associated with each body part involved in the intended movement. The modifications of these parameters typically relies on sensory feedback from one or more sensory modalities (see multisensory integration), such as proprioception and vision.
Goal-directed and coordinated movement of body parts is inherently variable because there are many ways of coordinating body parts to achieve the intended movement goal. This is because the degrees of freedom (DOF) is large for most movements due to the many associated neuro-musculoskeletal elements. Some examples of non-repeatable movements are when pointing or standing up from sitting. Actions and movements can be executed in multiple ways because synergies (as described below) can vary without changing the outcome. Early work from Nikolai Bernstein worked to understand how coordination was developed in executing a skilled movement. In this work, he remarked that there was no one-to-one relationship between the desired movement and coordination patterns to execute that movement. This equivalence suggests that any desired action does not have a particular coordination of neurons, muscles, and kinematics.
The complexity of motor coordination goes unnoticed in everyday tasks, such as in the task of picking up and pouring a bottle of water into a glass. This seemingly simple task is actually composed of multiple complex tasks. For instance, this task requires the following:
(1) properly reaching for the water bottle and then configuring the hand in a way that enables grasping the bottle.
(2) applying the correct amount of grip force to grasp the bottle without crushing it.
(3) coordinating the muscles required for lifting and articulating the bottle so that the water can be poured into the glass.
(4) terminating the action by placing the empty bottle back on the table.
Official source
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