Preregistration: Investigation of TMS Cortical Representations Reorganization During Motor Learning

Motor skill learning is involved in many aspects of our lives, such as participating in sports, playing a musical instrument or performing a surgical procedure. Acquisition of individual muscle movements, which is a necessary part of many motor skills, requires a so-called "surround inhibition" to be processed in the motor cortex. This phenomenon, which is supposed to be one of the essential mechanisms in movement individualization at the cortical level, has not been thoroughly investigated yet. Thus, the aim of this study will be an assessment of how learning a new specific fine motor skill, which we are expecting to induce surround inhibition, may influence the reorganization of the motor cortex. It is hypothesized that as a result of the motor skill learning overall overlap between muscle cortical representations will decrease and the difference between cortical excitability profiles of trained and non-trained muscles will increase. Navigated TMS with EMG-recording of the motor evoked potentials or MEPs of four upper limb muscles will be used in order to measure changes in the motor cortex before and after motor training. To this day, several pilot studies probing different TMS approaches to mapping and one pilot motor training were conducted. New inferences derived from these experiments will be considered in further development of the experimental procedures for the current study. This research is expected to provide a new insights into the changes in the motor cortex during learning process undergo in healthy subjects. This information could become a starting point for similar research in patients and athletes.