The hippocampus has recently been found to have an unexpected role related to the control of skilled actions like handwriting, typing, and playing musical instruments.
Researchers from the University of Birmingham have discovered a surprising function of the hippocampus, linking it to the management of skilled tasks such as handwriting, typing, and music performance.
While the hippocampus has long been known for its association with memory and spatial navigation, this new study challenges those established ideas and opens doors for potential rehabilitation methods for neurological and neurodegenerative conditions that impact movement.
In their latest publication in The Journal of Neuroscience on September 26, the research team provides evidence indicating that the hippocampus is involved in recalling and organizing flexible movement sequences from memory.
The researchers revisited functional MRI (fMRI) data to analyze brain activity in important subcortical regions while participants executed familiar finger sequences from memory using a force-sensitive keyboard, similar to playing the piano.
Although the motor regions in the basal ganglia and cerebellum, which are usually linked to “muscle memory” for learned motor skills, showed heightened activity during the task, the findings revealed that the hippocampus was the area that retained information about the specific order of fingers the participants intended to use. This means the hippocampus could hint at whether a person would type “fears” or “fares” based purely on its activity.
Dr. Katja Kornysheva, Associate Professor and lead author of the study at the University of Birmingham, remarked: “This finding is intriguing as it demonstrates that the systems in the brain responsible for episodic and procedural memory are more interconnected than we previously believed. This is particularly relevant when we need to adapt and switch between learned sequences, like when using a computer keyboard or playing music in a group.”
Dr. Rhys Yewbrey, a former doctoral student in Kornysheva’s research group and the first author of the paper, noted, “Our study indicates that the hippocampus is likely crucial for skilled and adaptable motor control, assisting in the planning of action sequences. This insight could pave the way for more effective training programs for rehabilitation focused on motor actions and for facilitating the learning of new skills.”
The team hopes that their discoveries will stimulate further research into how memory systems interact and inspire innovative therapies aimed at improving both motor abilities and cognitive health.
