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This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) All Versions of this Article: 581/3/971    most recent jphysiol.2006.126854v1 Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Weerakkody, N. S. Articles by Gandevia, S. C. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Weerakkody, N. S. Articles by Gandevia, S. C. Related Collections Neuroscience

¹ Prince of Wales Medical Research Institute and UNSW, Randwick, NSW 2031, Australia

These experiments assessed whether the impairment in proprioceptive acuity in the hand during ‘interfering’ cutaneous stimulation could be caused by inputs from Pacinian corpuscles. The ability to detect passive movements at the proximal interphalangeal joint of the index finger was measured when vibrotactile stimuli were applied to the adjacent middle finger and thenar eminence at frequencies and amplitudes that favour activation of rapidly adapting cutaneous afferents. Inputs from Pacinian corpuscles are favoured with high-frequency vibration (300 Hz), while those from Meissner corpuscles are favoured by lower frequencies (30 Hz). Detection of movement was significantly impaired when 300 Hz (20 µm peak-to-peak amplitude) complex vibration or 300 Hz (50 µm) sinusoidal vibration was applied to the middle finger and thenar eminence. In contrast, detection of movements was not altered by low-frequency sinusoidal vibration at 30 Hz with an amplitude of 50 µm or with a larger amplitude matched in subjective intensity to the 300 Hz sinusoidal stimulus. Thus it is unlikely that the impairment in detection was due to attention being diverted by vibration of an adjacent digit. In addition, an increase in amplitude of 300 Hz vibration led to a greater impairment of movement detection, so that the impairment was graded with the input. The time taken to nominate the direction of applied movement also increased during 300 Hz but not during 30 Hz sinusoidal vibration. These findings suggest that stimuli which preferentially activate Pacinian, but not Meissner corpuscles, impair proprioceptive acuity in a movement detection task.

(Received 19 December 2006; accepted after revision 21 March 2007; first published online 5 April 2007)
Corresponding author S. Gandevia: Prince of Wales Medical Research Institute, Barker Street, Randwick, NSW 2031, Australia. Email: s.gandevia{at}unsw.edu.au

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