The Role of Corticomuscular Transmission in Movement Execution

Current research in corticomuscular transmission, e.g. by assessing corticomuscular coherence during movement execution, has mainly focused on frequencies higher than 10 Hz. However, the effective bandwith of force generation at the spinal level has been proved to be below this frequency threshold. Recent studies are increasingly showing the importance of low-frequency modulations as a cortical control input in movement execution. Still, the presence of motion and muscular artifacts can significantly bias the role of slow cortical potentials. This work addresses current works that characterize corticomuscular motor pathways and discusses the effective bandwidth (in relation to force generation) of the corticomuscular drive to serve as base for present and future debate on the behavior of corticomuscular transmission in movement execution.