Basal ganglia and kinematics modulation: Insights from Parkinson’s and Huntington’s diseases

Autoimmunity and the basal ganglia: new insights into old diseases.

Sydenham's chorea (SC) occurs weeks or months after Group A streptococcal infection, and is characterized by involuntary, purposeless movements of the limbs, in addition to behavioural alteration. There is a body of evidence which suggests that SC is an immune-mediated brain disorder with regional localization to the basal ganglia. Recent reports have suggested that the spectrum of post-strepto...

MRI Tz Hypointensities in basal ganglia of premanifest Huntingtons disease

Motor sequences and the basal ganglia: kinematics, not habits.

Despite a lack of definitive evidence, it is frequently proposed that the basal ganglia (BG) motor circuit plays a critical role in the storage and execution of movement sequences (or motor habits). To test this hypothesis directly, we inactivated the sensorimotor territory of the globus pallidus internus (sGPi, the main BG motor output) in two monkeys trained to perform overlearned and random ...

Basal Ganglia: Insights into Origins from Lamprey Brains

The lamprey brain has now been shown to have basal ganglia circuitry, with an output that acts tonically on midbrain and brainstem motor centers and is modulated by ascending dopaminergic input. This condition was believed to represent the tetrapod condition, but now appears to be far more ancient.

Psychiatric aspects of basal ganglia diseases.

This review clarifies the fact that basal ganglia diseases are psychiatric as much as neurological diseases. It illustrates psychiatric aspects in Parkinson's disease and other hereditary basal ganglia diseases such as Wilson's disease, Huntington's chorea and others. In these diseases, psychological disorders can be difficult to diagnose, whether they are concomitant with the primary (neurolog...