Motor control beyond reach—how humans hit a target with a whip
Name
krotov-et-al-2022-motor-control-beyond-reach-how-humans-hit-a-target-with-a-whip.pdf
Size
1.45 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
7515f7c68ebbc1e48271a29ae047a968
Author(s)
Krotov, Aleksei
Russo, Marta
Nah, Moses
Hogan, Neville
Sternad, Dagmar
Date Issued
October 2022
Journal
Royal Society Open Science
Publisher
The Royal Society
Citation
Krotov A, Russo M, Nah M,Hogan N, Sternad D. 2022 Motor control beyond reach—how humans hit a target with a whip.R. Soc. Open Sci.9: 220581.
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Humans are strikingly adept at manipulating complex objects, from tying shoelaces to cracking a bullwhip. These motor skills have highly nonlinear interactive dynamics that defy reduction into parts. Yet, despite advances in data recording and processing, experiments in motor neuroscience still prioritize experimental reduction over realistic complexity. This study embraced the fully unconstrained behaviour of hitting a target with a 1.6-m bullwhip, both in rhythmic and discrete fashion. Adopting an object-centered approach to test the hypothesis that skilled movement simplifies the whip dynamics, the whip's evolution was characterized in relation to performance error and hand speed. Despite widely differing individual strategies, both discrete and rhythmic styles featured a cascade-like unfolding of the whip. Whip extension and orientation at peak hand speed predicted performance error, at least in the rhythmic style, suggesting that humans accomplished the task by setting initial conditions. These insights may inform further studies on human and robot control of complex objects.
Subjects
Multidisciplinary
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.220581
