García, Míriam R. and Pearlmutter, Barak A. and Wellstead, Peter E. and Middleton, Richard H. (2013) A Slow Axon Antidromic Blockade Hypothesis for Tremor Reduction via Deep Brain Stimulation. PLoS ONE, 8 (9). e73456. ISSN 1932-6203

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Abstract

Parkinsonian and essential tremor can often be effectively treated by deep brain stimulation. We propose a novel explanation for the mechanism by which this technique ameliorates tremor: a reduction of the delay in the relevant motor control loops via preferential antidromic blockade of slow axons. The antidromic blockade is preferential because the pulses more rapidly clear fast axons, and the distribution of axonal diameters, and therefore velocities, in the involved tracts, is sufficiently long-tailed to make this effect quite significant. The preferential blockade of slow axons, combined with gain adaptation, results in a reduction of the mean delay in the motor control loop, which serves to stabilize the feedback system, thus ameliorating tremor. This theory, without any tuning, accounts for several previously perplexing phenomena, and makes a variety of novel predictions.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2013 García et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. **13 Aug 2014: The PLOS ONE Staff (2014) Correction: A Slow Axon Antidromic Blockade Hypothesis for Tremor Reduction via Deep Brain Stimulation. PLoS ONE 9(8): e106145. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0106145
Keywords:	Slow Axon Antidromic Blockade Hypothesis; Tremor Reduction; Deep Brain Stimulation;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Science and Engineering > Computer Science
Item ID:	6546
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0073456
Depositing User:	Barak Pearlmutter
Date Deposited:	09 Nov 2015 16:43
Journal or Publication Title:	PLoS ONE
Publisher:	Public Library of Science
Refereed:	Yes
Funders:	Science Foundation Ireland (SFI)
URI:	http://journals.plos.org
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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