Overlap in neural representations of coordinated wrist and finger movements in human motor cortex

Abstract Dexterous hand function underlies many essential human activities, from tool use to expression through gestures. Coordinated digit movements are enabled by the intricate musculature of the hand and forearm, which also imposes mechanical coupling between the digits and wrist, constraining their independent control. It remains unclear whether motor cortex inherits these constraints in its activity or encodes digit and wrist independently. To address this problem, we asked individuals with intracortical microelectrode arrays implanted in motor cortex to attempt flexion and extension of individual digits, either in isolation or in combination with attempted wrist movements. We could accurately decode which digit was moving based on cortical recordings, and channels selective for digit identity were arranged somatotopically across the recording arrays. Nevertheless, the activity during flexion or extension overlapped between digits, and movement direction of a given digit could be reliably inferred by a decoder trained on movements of other digits. This directional signal was largely invariant to the digit’s initial posture. The population axis describing digit movement direction was aligned with the axes associated with wrist flexion-extension or pronation-supination. This alignment persisted during simultaneous wrist and digit movements, which complicated efforts to control them individually. However, by decoding wrist and digit motion from activity orthogonal to the shared direction axis, a participant was able to achieve continuous control of virtual hand movements with improved speed and reduced unintended movements. Together, the results identify both a code for digit identity and a low-dimensional flexion-extension signal which is shared across the digits and wrist. This arrangement is consistent with muscle-like biomechanical constraints on motor cortical activity, which must be accounted for to improve coordinated BCI control.