Implanted microelectrode arrays in reinnervated muscles allow separation of neural drives from transferred polyfunctional nerves
File(s)
Published version
Supporting information
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Targeted muscle reinnervation surgery reroutes residual nerve signals into spare muscles, enabling the recovery of neural information through electromyography (EMG). However, EMG signals are often overlapping, making the interpretation of limb functions complicated. Regenerative peripheral nerve interfaces surgically partition the nerve into individual fascicles that reinnervate specific muscle grafts, isolating distinct neural sources for precise control and interpretation of EMG signals. Here we combine targeted muscle reinnervation surgery of polyvalent nerves with a high-density microelectrode array implanted at a single site within a reinnervated muscle, and via mathematical source separation methods, we separate all neural signals that are redirected into a single muscle. In participants with upper-limb amputation, the deconvolution of EMG signals from four reinnervated muscles into motor unit spike trains revealed distinct clusters of motor neurons associated with diverse functional tasks. Our method enabled the extraction of multiple neural commands within a single reinnervated muscle, eliminating the need for surgical nerve division. This approach holds promises for enhancing control over prosthetic limbs and for understanding how the central nervous system encodes movement after reinnervation.
Date Issued
2026-07-01
Date Acceptance
2025-09-12
Citation
Nature Biomedical Engineering, 2026, 10 (7), pp.1485-1500
ISSN
2157-846X
Publisher
Nature Research
Start Page
1485
End Page
1500
Journal / Book Title
Nature Biomedical Engineering
Volume
10
Issue
7
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2025 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
License URL
Identifier
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/41136604
PII: 10.1038/s41551-025-01537-y
Subjects
ACTIVATION PATTERNS
AMPUTEES
COMMON SYNAPTIC INPUT
Engineering
Engineering, Biomedical
MOTOR UNITS
NEURONS
Science & Technology
SYNERGIES
Technology
Publication Status
Published
Coverage Spatial
England
Date Publish Online
2025-10-24