Deep brain stimulation treatment allows for the recording of local field potentials in the subthalamic nucleus of patients with Parkinsons disease. This has revealed that beta band oscillations (13-30Hz) are a hallmark of the disease. In this presentation, I will first show how beta band oscillations relate to Parkinsonian symptoms. Their coupling with high-frequency oscillations (HFO, 150-400Hz) might be an important clue in order to understand how they lead to movement impairment. However, little is known about the neuronal origin of these HFO. We investigated whether they are likely to arise from the same cell populations as beta oscillations using intra-operative recordings. This involved localization of electrode contacts on post-operative MRI scans and warping to MNI space for group-level results. Finally, in the last part of the talk I will present our efforts to study the effect of dopaminergic medication on synaptic coupling strengths within the cortico-basal ganglia circuit using dynamic causal modelling.
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