ArticlePLoS biology2019
Somatosensory cortex participates in the consolidation of human motor memory.
Article in PLoS biology, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 51 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
51 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 92 citations in OpenAlex.
- A Systematic Review of the Learning Dynamics of Proprioception Training: Specificity, Acquisition, Retention, and Transfer.Neurorehabilitation and neural repair · 2023Pooled it
- Modulation of somatosensation by transcranial magnetic stimulation over somatosensory cortex: a systematic review.Experimental brain research · 2023Pooled it
- Effects of Different Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Targets for Enhancing Motor Learning: A Single-Blind Randomized Controlled Trial.Neural plasticity · 2026Trial
- I Can Step Clearly Now, the TENS Is On: Transcutaneous Electric Nerve Stimulation Decreases Sensorimotor Uncertainty during Stepping Movements.Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Trial
- Sensory basis of speech motor learning and memory.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Global remapping of the sensory homunculus emerges early in childhood development.Nature communications · 2026Article
- From Spontaneous Ignitions to Sensorimotor Cell Assemblies via Dopamine: A Spiking Neurocomputational Model of Infants' Hand Action Acquisition.Brain sciences · 2026Article
- Prior text-based learning enhances the benefits of simulation-based learning on confidence and long-term recall.NPJ science of learning · 2025Article
- Savings in visuomotor learning are associated with connectivity changes within a cerebello-thalamo-cortical network encoding movement errors.Brain structure & function · 2025Article
- Article
- The Somatosensory Cortex and Body Representation: Updating the Motor System during a Visuoproprioceptive Cue Conflict.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2025Article
- Transcutaneous spinal random noise stimulation enhances motor memory consolidation and corticospinal transmission in humans.The Journal of physiology · 2025Article
- Theta-burst stimulation over primary somatosensory cortex modulates the tactile acuity of the tongue.Journal of neurophysiology · 2025Article
- Intra-somatosensory cortical circuits mediating pain-induced analgesia.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Probing sensorimotor memory through the human speech-audiomotor system.Journal of neurophysiology · 2025Article
- Partial FAM19A5 deficiency in mice leads to disrupted spine maturation, hyperactivity, and an altered fear response.PloS one · 2025Article
- Neural signatures of online and offline motor learning: An ALE meta-analysis.Imaging neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2025Article
- Gating of Neuroplasticity: Effects and Mechanisms of Acute Aerobic Exercise as a Brain Stimulation for the Sensorimotor Cortex.Advances in neurobiology · 2025Review
- A neurocognitive pathway for engineering artificial touch.Science advances · 2024Review
- Does pre-speech auditory modulation reflect processes related to feedback monitoring or speech movement planning?Neuroscience letters · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Newly learned motor skills are initially labile and then consolidated to permit retention. The circuits that enable the consolidation of motor memories remain uncertain. Most work to date has focused on primary motor cortex, and although there is ample evidence of learning-related plasticity in motor cortex, direct evidence for its involvement in memory consolidation is limited. Learning-related plasticity is also observed in somatosensory cortex, and accordingly, it may also be involved in memory consolidation. Here, by using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to block consolidation, we report the first direct evidence that plasticity in somatosensory cortex participates in the consolidation of motor memory. Participants made movements to targets while a robot applied forces to the hand to alter somatosensory feedback. Immediately following adaptation, continuous theta-burst transcranial magnetic stimulation (cTBS) was delivered to block retention; then, following a 24-hour delay, which would normally permit consolidation, we assessed whether there was an impairment. It was found that when mechanical loads were introduced gradually to engage implicit learning processes, suppression of somatosensory cortex following training almost entirely eliminated retention. In contrast, cTBS to motor cortex following learning had little effect on retention at all; retention following cTBS to motor cortex was not different than following sham TMS stimulation. We confirmed that cTBS to somatosensory cortex interfered with normal sensory function and that it blocked motor memory consolidation and not the ability to retrieve a consolidated motor memory. In conclusion, the findings are consistent with the hypothesis that in adaptation learning, somatosensory cortex rather than motor cortex is involved in the consolidation of motor memory.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.