Biomedical subjects

Kevin C Engel

Publications and source records attributed to Kevin C Engel.

2 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2004

Deficits in ocular and manual tracking due to episodic ataxia type 2.

Four patients with a novel mutation leading to episodic ataxia type 2 were studied in a task that required them to track target motion either with the eyes or with the index finger of the right hand. The target initially moved in a straight line and then changed direction at an unpredictable time by an unpredictable amount. On the day of testing, 3 of the patients were evaluated as normal on a neurological exam, whereas the fourth was severely ataxic. Nevertheless, all 4 showed deficits in tracking behavior with common features. Ocular tracking tended to result in hypermetric saccades at longer than normal latencies. Smooth pursuit tracking was absent in 1 patient and had lower than normal gain in the others. Deficits in manual tracking showed similarities to the deficits in ocular tracking, with hypermetric compensations for changes in target direction. The similarities in the deficits in manual and ocular tracking suggest that they are subject to similar control by the cerebellar structures.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Interactions between ocular motor and manual responses during two-dimensional tracking.

Tracking of a moving target usually involves coordinated movements of the eye and the hand. To study the extent to which one behavior influences the other, eye and hand movements were recorded during three conditions (eye alone, hand alone, and eye and hand together) where subjects tracked a target that initially moved in a straight line and then made an abrupt and unpredictable change in direction. The response latencies of the eye and hand were influenced by the presence of the other tracking modality. More specifically, the latency for the hand was decreased during concomitant ocular tracking, whereas the latency for the eye was increased during combined hand-eye tracking. Moreover, the velocity profile of the smooth pursuit component of ocular tracking was different when the hand also tracked the target. Taken together, these observations support the hypothesis that at least part of the neural substrate underlying tracking is shared by the two modalities.

Hand↗