A cortico-cerebellar loop for motor planning

Zhenyu Gao, Courtney Davis, Alyse M. Thomas, Michael N. Economo, Amada M. Abrego, Karel Svoboda, Chris I De Zeeuw, Nuo Li

New work spearheaded by Gao (Erasmus University MC) and Nuo (Baylor College of Medicine) came out today in Nature.  This work implicates the cerebellum in motor planning in addition to its long-appreciated roles in controlling the timing of movement and in correcting errors.  These findings underscore the need to expand beyond studies focused on single brain regions in isolation to understand how complex behaviors arise.