Mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness

Abstract Mental imagery represents a potential countermeasure for sensorimotor and cognitive dysfunctions due to spaceflight. It might help train people to deal with conditions unique to spaceflight. Thus, dynamic interactions with the inertial motion of weightless objects are only experienced in we...

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Autores principales:	Silvio Gravano, Francesco Lacquaniti, Myrka Zago
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Nature Portfolio 2021
Materias:	Biotechnology TP248.13-248.65 Physiology QP1-981
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/9c2fe5a448f94c50ba3bdb56a12366b7
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:9c2fe5a448f94c50ba3bdb56a12366b72021-12-05T12:19:17ZMental imagery of object motion in weightlessness10.1038/s41526-021-00179-z2373-8065https://doaj.org/article/9c2fe5a448f94c50ba3bdb56a12366b72021-12-01T00:00:00Zhttps://doi.org/10.1038/s41526-021-00179-zhttps://doaj.org/toc/2373-8065Abstract Mental imagery represents a potential countermeasure for sensorimotor and cognitive dysfunctions due to spaceflight. It might help train people to deal with conditions unique to spaceflight. Thus, dynamic interactions with the inertial motion of weightless objects are only experienced in weightlessness but can be simulated on Earth using mental imagery. Such training might overcome the problem of calibrating fine-grained hand forces and estimating the spatiotemporal parameters of the resulting object motion. Here, a group of astronauts grasped an imaginary ball, threw it against the ceiling or the front wall, and caught it after the bounce, during pre-flight, in-flight, and post-flight experiments. They varied the throwing speed across trials and imagined that the ball moved under Earth’s gravity or weightlessness. We found that the astronauts were able to reproduce qualitative differences between inertial and gravitational motion already on ground, and further adapted their behavior during spaceflight. Thus, they adjusted the throwing speed and the catching time, equivalent to the duration of virtual ball motion, as a function of the imaginary 0 g condition versus the imaginary 1 g condition. Arm kinematics of the frontal throws further revealed a differential processing of imagined gravity level in terms of the spatial features of the arm and virtual ball trajectories. We suggest that protocols of this kind may facilitate sensorimotor adaptation and help tuning vestibular plasticity in-flight, since mental imagery of gravitational motion is known to engage the vestibular cortex.Silvio GravanoFrancesco LacquanitiMyrka ZagoNature PortfolioarticleBiotechnologyTP248.13-248.65PhysiologyQP1-981ENnpj Microgravity, Vol 7, Iss 1, Pp 1-14 (2021)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Biotechnology TP248.13-248.65 Physiology QP1-981
spellingShingle	Biotechnology TP248.13-248.65 Physiology QP1-981 Silvio Gravano Francesco Lacquaniti Myrka Zago Mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness
description	Abstract Mental imagery represents a potential countermeasure for sensorimotor and cognitive dysfunctions due to spaceflight. It might help train people to deal with conditions unique to spaceflight. Thus, dynamic interactions with the inertial motion of weightless objects are only experienced in weightlessness but can be simulated on Earth using mental imagery. Such training might overcome the problem of calibrating fine-grained hand forces and estimating the spatiotemporal parameters of the resulting object motion. Here, a group of astronauts grasped an imaginary ball, threw it against the ceiling or the front wall, and caught it after the bounce, during pre-flight, in-flight, and post-flight experiments. They varied the throwing speed across trials and imagined that the ball moved under Earth’s gravity or weightlessness. We found that the astronauts were able to reproduce qualitative differences between inertial and gravitational motion already on ground, and further adapted their behavior during spaceflight. Thus, they adjusted the throwing speed and the catching time, equivalent to the duration of virtual ball motion, as a function of the imaginary 0 g condition versus the imaginary 1 g condition. Arm kinematics of the frontal throws further revealed a differential processing of imagined gravity level in terms of the spatial features of the arm and virtual ball trajectories. We suggest that protocols of this kind may facilitate sensorimotor adaptation and help tuning vestibular plasticity in-flight, since mental imagery of gravitational motion is known to engage the vestibular cortex.
format	article
author	Silvio Gravano Francesco Lacquaniti Myrka Zago
author_facet	Silvio Gravano Francesco Lacquaniti Myrka Zago
author_sort	Silvio Gravano
title	Mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness
title_short	Mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness
title_full	Mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness
title_fullStr	Mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness
title_full_unstemmed	Mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness
title_sort	mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness
publisher	Nature Portfolio
publishDate	2021
url	https://doaj.org/article/9c2fe5a448f94c50ba3bdb56a12366b7
work_keys_str_mv	AT silviogravano mentalimageryofobjectmotioninweightlessness AT francescolacquaniti mentalimageryofobjectmotioninweightlessness AT myrkazago mentalimageryofobjectmotioninweightlessness
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Mental imagery of object motion in weightlessness

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