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Neurophysiological oscillatory mechanisms underlying the effect of mirror visual feedback-induced illusion of hand movements on nociception and cortical activation
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  • Marco Rizzo,
  • Laura Petrini,
  • Claudio Del Percio,
  • Lars Arendt-Nielsen,
  • Claudio Babiloni
Marco Rizzo
Aalborg University

Corresponding Author:marco@hst.aau.dk

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Laura Petrini
Aalborg University
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Claudio Del Percio
Universita La Sapienza
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Lars Arendt-Nielsen
Aalborg University
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Claudio Babiloni
University of Foggia
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Abstract

Mirror Visual Feedback (MVF)-induced illusion of hand movements produces beneficial effects in patients with chronic pain. However, neurophysiological mechanisms underlying these effects are poorly known. Here we hypothesized that such an MVF-induced movement illusion may exert its effects by changing the activity in midline cortical areas of the pain neural matrix. Electrical stimuli with individually fixed intensity were applied to the left hand in healthy adults to produce painful and non-painful sensations during unilateral right-hand movements with such an MVF illusion and right and bilateral hand movements without MVF. During these events, electroencephalographic (EEG) activity was recorded from 64 scalp electrodes. Event-related desynchronization (ERD) of EEG alpha rhythms (8-12 Hz) indexed the neurophysiological oscillatory mechanisms inducing cortical activation. As compared to the painful sensations, the non-painful sensations were specifically characterized by (1) lower alpha ERD estimated in the cortical midline, angular gyrus, and lateral parietal regions during the experimental condition with MVF and (2) higher alpha ERD estimated in the lateral prefrontal and parietal regions during the control conditions without MVF. These core results suggest that the MVF-induced movement illusion may affect nociception and neurophysiological oscillatory mechanisms reducing the activation in cortical limbic and default mode regions.