Frontoparietal Tracts Linked to Lateralized Hand Preference and Manual Specialization

Henrietta Howells, Michel Thiebaut de Schotten, Flavio Dell’Acqua, Ahmad Beyh, Giuseppe Zappalà, Anoushka Leslie, Andrew Simmons, Declan G Murphy, Marco Catani
Cerebral Cortex. 2018-04-21; 28(7): 2482-2494
DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhy040

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1. Cereb Cortex. 2018 Jul 1;28(7):2482-2494. doi: 10.1093/cercor/bhy040.

Frontoparietal Tracts Linked to Lateralized Hand Preference and Manual
Specialization.

Howells H(1)(2), Thiebaut de Schotten M(3)(4), Dell’Acqua F(1)(2), Beyh A(1)(2),
Zappalà G(5), Leslie A(2), Simmons A(2), Murphy DG(1), Catani M(1)(2).

Author information:
(1)Natbrainlab, Sackler Institute for Translational Neurodevelopment, Forensic
and Neurodevelopmental Sciences, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology &
Neuroscience, Denmark Hill, London, UK.
(2)Centre for Neuroimaging Sciences, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology &
Neuroscience, King’s College London, Denmark Hill, London, UK.
(3)Brain Connectivity and Behaviour Group, Sorbonne Universities, Hôpital de la
Salpêtrière, Paris, France.
(4)Frontlab, Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle épinière (ICM), UPMC UMRS 1127,
Inserm U 1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Paris, France.
(5)Garibaldi Hospital, Piazza Santa Maria di Gesú, 5, Catania, Italy.

Humans show a preference for using the right hand over the left for tasks and
activities of everyday life. While experimental work in non-human primates has
identified the neural systems responsible for reaching and grasping, the neural
basis of lateralized motor behavior in humans remains elusive. The advent of
diffusion imaging tractography for studying connectional anatomy in the living
human brain provides the possibility of understanding the relationship between
hemispheric asymmetry, hand preference, and manual specialization. In this study,
diffusion tractography was used to demonstrate an interaction between hand
preference and the asymmetry of frontoparietal tracts, specifically the dorsal
branch of the superior longitudinal fasciculus, responsible for visuospatial
integration and motor planning. This is in contrast to the corticospinal tract
and the superior cerebellar peduncle, for which asymmetry was not related to hand
preference. Asymmetry of the dorsal frontoparietal tract was also highly
correlated with the degree of lateralization in tasks requiring visuospatial
integration and fine motor control. These results suggest a common anatomical
substrate for hand preference and lateralized manual specialization in
frontoparietal tracts important for visuomotor processing.

DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhy040
PMCID: PMC6005057
PMID: 29688293 [Indexed for MEDLINE]

Auteurs Bordeaux Neurocampus