Public Thesis defense - ICTEAM

Short- and long-term adaptation of grip dynamics and arm kinematics to novel gravito-inertial environments by Laurent OPSOMER

Pour l’obtention du grade de Docteur en sciences de l’ingénieur et technologie

During object manipulation on Earth, muscular activities reflect an anticipation of the force of gravity. These loads must be compensated for or can be used to save muscular effort as well as to improve limb position sense. Furthermore, the gravitational vector constitutes a very important reference axis for spatial orientation. Given the promising future of Space exploration, a good understanding of the role played by gravity in sensorimotor control and of how the central nervous system adapts to novel gravito-inertial backgrounds is crucial. In this thesis, we study the dynamics of finger forces and the kinematics of the arm during object manipulation in humans exposed to such altered gravito-inertial environments. We first explore the coordination between arm movements and finger forces in Mars, Moon and micro- gravity during parabolic flight maneuvers. We then study sensorimotor coordination in upright and upside-down participants on the ground to test the contributions of body-centered and gravity-centered reference frames to upper-limb motor control. Finally, we study sensorimotor coordination in astronauts and observe that finger forces are finely tuned to object properties and to movement-induced inertial loads, both on the ground and in the weightless environment of the International Space Station. However, gravity appears to be critical to maintain movement accuracy in the absence of vision. These works contribute to our understanding of how gravity is accounted for during motor planning and control and of the impacts of novel gravito-inertial contexts on upper-limb motor control.

Jury members :

• Prof. Philippe Lefèvre (UCLouvain), supervisor
• Prof. Jean-Louis Thonnard (UCLouvain), supervisor
• Prof. Roland Keunings (UCLouvain), chairperson
• Prof. Frédéric Crevecoeur (UCLouvain), secretary
• Prof. Francesco Lacquaniti (Université de Rome Tor Vergata, Italy)
• Prof. Joseph McIntyre (Ikerbasque Science Foundation, Spain)
• Dr. Fabrice Sarlegna (Université Aix-Marseille, France)

Pay attention :

The public defense of Laurent Opsomer scheduled for Thursday 30 September at 4:15 p.m will take place in the form of a video conference Teams

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