Breveglieri Rossella, Brandolani Riccardo, Galletti Claudio, Avenanti Alessio, Fattori Patrizia
Department of Biomedical and Neuromotor Sciences, University of Bologna, Piazza di Porta San Donato, 2, 40126 Bologna Italy.
Department of Biomedical and Neuromotor Sciences, University of Bologna, Piazza di Porta San Donato, 2, 40126 Bologna Italy; University of Camerino, Center for Neuroscience, 62032 Camerino Italy.
Neuroimage. 2025 Aug 1;316:121301. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2025.121301. Epub 2025 Jun 3.
Cortico-cortical paired associative stimulation (ccPAS) is a powerful transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) protocol thought to rely on Hebbian plasticity and known to strengthen effective connectivity, mainly within frontal lobe networks. Here, we expand on previous work by exploring the effects of ccPAS on the pathway linking the medial posterior parietal area hV6A with the primary motor cortex (M1), whose plasticity mechanisms remain largely unexplored. To assess the effective connectivity of the hV6A-M1 network, we measured motor-evoked potentials (MEPs) in 30 right-handed volunteers at rest during dual-site, paired-pulse TMS. Consistent with previous findings, we found that MEPs were inhibited when the conditioning stimulus over hV6A preceded the test stimulus over M1 by 12 ms, highlighting inhibitory hV6A-M1 causal interactions. We then manipulated the hV6A-M1 circuit via ccPAS using different inter-stimulus intervals (ISI) never tested before. Our results revealed a time-dependent modulation. Specifically, only when the conditioning stimulus preceded the test one by 12 ms did we find a gradual increase of MEP amplitude during ccPAS, and excitatory aftereffects. In contrast, when ccPAS was applied with an ISI of 4 ms or 500 ms, no corticospinal excitability changes were observed, suggesting that temporal specificity is a critical factor in modulating the hV6A-M1 network. These results suggest that ccPAS can induce time-dependent Hebbian plasticity in the dorsomedial parieto-frontal network at rest, offering novel insights into the network's plasticity and temporal dynamics.
皮质-皮质配对联想刺激(ccPAS)是一种强大的经颅磁刺激(TMS)方案,被认为依赖于赫布可塑性,并且已知其可增强有效连接,主要是在额叶网络内。在此,我们通过探索ccPAS对连接内侧后顶叶区域hV6A与初级运动皮层(M1)的通路的影响,扩展了先前的研究工作,该通路的可塑性机制在很大程度上仍未被探索。为了评估hV6A-M1网络的有效连接,我们在30名右利手志愿者静息状态下进行双部位、配对脉冲TMS时测量了运动诱发电位(MEP)。与先前的研究结果一致,我们发现当hV6A上的条件刺激先于M1上的测试刺激12毫秒时,MEP受到抑制,突出了hV6A-M1之间的抑制性因果相互作用。然后,我们通过ccPAS以以前从未测试过的不同刺激间隔(ISI)来操纵hV6A-M1回路。我们的结果揭示了一种时间依赖性调制。具体而言,只有当条件刺激先于测试刺激12毫秒时,我们才发现在ccPAS期间MEP幅度逐渐增加,以及兴奋性后效应。相比之下,当以4毫秒或500毫秒的ISI应用ccPAS时,未观察到皮质脊髓兴奋性变化,这表明时间特异性是调节hV6A-M1网络的关键因素。这些结果表明,ccPAS可以在静息状态下的背内侧顶叶-额叶网络中诱导时间依赖性的赫布可塑性,为该网络的可塑性和时间动态提供了新的见解。