Abstract：
While the shape of cortical oscillations is increasingly recognised to be physiologically and functionally informative, its relevance to the aging motor system has not been established. We therefore examined the shape of alpha and beta band oscillations recorded at rest, as well as during performance of simple and go/no-go reaction time tasks, in 33 young (23.3 ± 2.9 years, 27 females) and 27 older (60.0 ± 5.2 years, 23 females) adults. The shape of individual oscillatory cycles was characterised using a recently developed pipeline involving empirical mode decomposition, before being decomposed into waveform motifs using principal component analysis. This revealed four principal components that were uniquely influenced by task and/or age. These described specific dimensions of shape and tended to be modulated during the reaction phase of each task. Our results suggest that although oscillation shape is task-dependent, the nature of this effect is altered by advancing age, possibly reflecting alterations in cortical activity. These outcomes demonstrate the utility of this approach for understanding the neurophysiological effects of ageing.
摘要：
虽然皮层振荡的形状越来越被认为是生理和功能上的信息，它与老化的电机系统的相关性尚未确定。因此，我们检查了静止时记录的α和β带振荡的形状，以及在执行简单和执行/不执行反应时间任务期间，在33名年轻人(23.3±2.9岁，27名女性）和27岁以上（60.0±5.2岁，23名女性）成人。使用最近开发的涉及经验模式分解的管道来表征各个振荡周期的形状，在使用主成分分析分解为波形基序之前。这揭示了受任务和/或年龄影响的四个主要成分。这些描述了形状的特定尺寸，并倾向于在每个任务的反应阶段进行调制。我们的结果表明，尽管振荡形状与任务有关，这种影响的性质随着年龄的增长而改变，可能反映了皮质活动的改变。这些结果证明了这种方法对于理解衰老的神经生理效应的实用性。
