Short latency cerebellar modulation of the basal ganglia

Abstract

The graceful, purposeful motion of our body is an engineering feat which remains unparalleled in robotic devices using advanced artificial intelligence. Much of the information required for complex movements is generated by the cerebellum and the basal ganglia in conjunction with the cortex. Cerebellum and basal ganglia have been thought to communicate with each other only through slow multi-synaptic cortical loops, begging the question as to how they coordinate their outputs in real time. Here we show in mice that the cerebellum rapidly modulates the activity of the striatum via a disynaptic pathway. Under physiological conditions this short latency pathway is capable of facilitating optimal motor control by allowing the basal ganglia to incorporate time-sensitive cerebellar information and by guiding the sign of cortico-striatal plasticity. Conversely, under pathological condition this pathway relays aberrant cerebellar activity to the basal ganglia to cause dystonia.