Discharge characteristics of motor

units during long contractions

Michael Pascoe, M.S.
 Background
• Motor unit
• Functional quantum of
the neuromuscular
system
• Comprises an alpha
MN, its axon, and all the
muscle fibers it
innervates
 Research Questions
• How long can a human voluntarily
activate a motor unit?
• How does the discharge behavior
change with time?
Surface EMG
Abduction force
Fine wire SMU
 Spike2 - Sample Data
0.75 V
MU

iEMG 0.75 V

1V
sEMG

5 %MVC
Force

100 s
 Flowchart
Motor Unit
Spike2 Data
Discharge Times

mu_anal_longdur.m Divide Into 5 Equal

Duration Epochs

Interspike Intervals

Filter Out Long Intervals Filter Out Short Intervals

(> 250 ms) (< 10 ms)

Calculate Discharge
SpikeStats.txt
Characteristics
Input
 Epoch Boundaries
epoch(1) epoch(2) epoch(3) epoch(4) epoch(5)

0.75 V
MU

iEMG 0.75 V

1V
sEMG

5 %MVC
Force

first spike 100 s last spike

Creating Equal Duration Epochs
for i = 1:length(dis)
if (dis(i) < epoch1_end)
epoch(1).values(j) = dis(i);
j=j+1;

elseif (dis(i) > epoch1_end & dis(i) < epoch2_end)

epoch(2).values(k)=dis(i);
k=k+1;

elseif (dis(i) > epoch2_end & dis(i) < epoch3_end)

epoch(3).values(l)=dis(i);
l=l+1;

elseif (dis(i) > epoch3_end & dis(i) < epoch4_end)

epoch(4).values(m)=dis(i);
m=m+1;

elseif (dis(i) > epoch4_end & dis(i) <= dis(end))

epoch(5).values(n)=dis(i);
n=n+1;
end
end
 Create interspike intervals
% Determine interspike interval in seconds
isi(i).values = diff(epoch(i).values);

Filter interspike intervals

% Remove ISIs greater than 0.25 or less than 0.01 s (<4 or >100pps)
isi(i).values = isi(i).values(find(isi(i).values<0.25 & isi(i).values>0.01));
sizeisifilt(i).values = size(isi(i).values);
Discharge Characteristics
• Mean discharge rate • Mean interspike interval
• Standard deviation of • Standard deviation of
discharge rate interspike interval

• Coefficient of variation • Coefficient of variation

for discharge rate for interspike interval

• Standard error of the

mean of discharge rate

Stein et al. Nat Rev Neurosci 2005, 6: 389-397

Output
 Output
• A single text file (one trial)
• Subject initials and date preserved
• _SpikeStats.txt in place of _Times.txt
• Column headers in first row
• Output variable values in five rows
Output
 Output
Trial Name Mean DR (pps-direct) Mean D
BKB_(11_21_2007)_Times 11.24653
10.682879
11.581364
9.844349
9.934456
 Validation
Epoch(5) MATLAB Spike2
MeanDR (pps) 7.334067 7.33
Std Dev DR (pps) 1.093795 1.09
CV DR (%) 14.913897 14.91
Mean ISI (ms) 136.35 136.35
Std Dev ISI (ms) 55.07046 55.07
CV ISI (%) 40.389043 40.39
Start Time (s) 919.57823 919.578
End Time (s) 974.89423 974.894
Train Dur (s) 55.18775 55.188
No. Impulses 39 39
No. ISIs 38 38
ISIs < 10 ms 0 0
ISIs > 250 ms 46 46
 In the near future...
• Analysis of surface EMG
• Analysis of index finger abduction force
• Distribution statistics for discharge times