| Abstract: | Reorganization of the parameters of efferent activity produced in the spinal generator by electrical stimulation of the ipsilateral hindlimb muscle nerves during different limb positions were investigated in decerebrate immobilized cats. A direct relationship was found between this reordering and the stage at which stimuli were applied. The rearranged duration of the scratch cycle showed a tendency to bring motor activity into phase with stimuli so that the stimulus falls due at the onset of the motor activity phase. This phasically collated rearrangement was observed where a shift had occurred in the relationship between "aiming" and "scratch" motion tending towards intensified activity in the muscles innervated by the stimulated nerve. Rearrangement became more evident when the hindlimb deflected from the target position in accordance with the direction of muscle stretching. The physiological significance of the interposition of the "no rearrangement" phase is discussed. It is deduced that this absence of change in duration and intensity can only be produced simultaneously when a certain relationship is achieved between the phase of afferent signal reception in the scratch cycle and signal intensity.A. A. Bogomolets Institute of Physiology, Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR, Kiev. Translated from Neirofiziologiya, Vol. 19, No. 3, pp. 372–382, May–June, 1987. |
