ArticleeLife2021
Increasing human motor skill acquisition by driving theta-gamma coupling.
Article in eLife, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT05576129 (Theta-gamma Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation), which is not on this map. Cited by 35 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
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.
Theta-gamma Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation (tACS) to Modulate Activity in Sensorimotor Cortex for Improvement of Motor Skill Acquisition in Stroke Patients
Who cites it
35 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Oscillatory dynamics of motor learning across adulthood life span: a systematic review.Frontiers in aging neuroscience · 2025Pooled it
- Regulation of Somatosensory Temporal Discrimination Threshold Through Motor Training: An EEG and Kinematics Study.CNS neuroscience & therapeutics · 2025Trial
- IpsiHand Brain-Computer Interface Therapy Induces Broad Upper Extremity Motor Rehabilitation in Chronic Stroke.Neurorehabilitation and neural repair · 2025Trial
- Hippocampal skill memory expansion drives online performance dynamics during skill learning.Cell reports · 2026Article
- Skill Memory Expansion Shapes Micro-Scale Dynamics of Skill Learning.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Brain-Computer Interfaces: The Dawn of a New Era in Disease Treatment.Exploration (Beijing, China) · 2026Review
- Transcranial alternating current stimulation improves ballistic motor performance in trained and untrained limbs of healthy older adults.GeroScience · 2026Article
- Roles of beta synchronization for motor skill acquisition change after stroke.Brain communications · 2026Article
- Frequency-Dependent Modulation of the Prefrontal Cortex by Low-Intensity Focused Ultrasound: Impact on Mesolimbic Dopamine Signaling.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Differential Beta and Gamma Activity Modulation during Unimanual and Bimanual Motor Learning.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2025Article
- Cortical signatures linked to behavior quantitatively track arousal levels.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Phase-lagged tACS between executive and default mode networks modulates working memory.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Human cortical high-gamma power scales with movement rate in healthy participants and stroke survivors.The Journal of physiology · 2025Article
- The Effects of Theta-Gamma Peak Stimulation on Sensorimotor Learning During Speech Production.Neurobiology of language (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2025Article
- Human motor cortical gamma activity relates to GABAergic intracortical inhibition and motor learning.Imaging neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2025Article
- Encephalography cross-frequency coupling and brain alteration in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.Brain communications · 2025Article
- Transsynaptic modulation of cerebellar nuclear cells: theta AC-burst stimulation.Journal of neural engineering · 2024Article
- An overview of the effects and mechanisms of transcranial stimulation frequency on motor learning.Journal of neuroengineering and rehabilitation · 2024Review
- Exploring the Therapeutic Effects and Mechanisms of Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation on Improving Walking Ability in Stroke Patients via Modulating Cerebellar Gamma Frequency Band-a Narrative Review.Cerebellum (London, England) · 2024Review
- How to design optimal brain stimulation to modulate phase-amplitude coupling?Journal of neural engineering · 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
9 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Skill learning is a fundamental adaptive process, but the mechanisms remain poorly understood. Some learning paradigms, particularly in the memory domain, are closely associated with gamma activity that is amplitude modulated by the phase of underlying theta activity, but whether such nested activity patterns also underpin skill learning is unknown. Here, we addressed this question by using transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) over sensorimotor cortex to modulate theta-gamma activity during motor skill acquisition, as an exemplar of a non-hippocampal-dependent task. We demonstrated, and then replicated, a significant improvement in skill acquisition with theta-gamma tACS, which outlasted the stimulation by an hour. Our results suggest that theta-gamma activity may be a common mechanism for learning across the brain and provides a putative novel intervention for optimizing functional improvements in response to training or therapy.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
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.