Electrocortical amplitude modulations of human level-ground, slope, and stair walking

This study investigates if the electrocortical amplitude modulations relative to the mean gait cycle are different across walking conditions (i.e., level-ground (LW), ramp ascent (RA), and stair ascent (SA)). Non-invasive electroencephalography (EEG) signals were recorded and a systematic EEG processing method was implemented to reduce artifacts. Source localization using independent component analysis and k-means clustering revealed the involvement of four clusters in the brain (Left and Right Occipital Lobe, Posterior Parietal Cortex (PPC), and Sensorimotor Area) during the walking tasks. We found that electrocortical amplitude modulations varied across different walking conditions. Specifically, our results showed that the modulations in the PPC shifted to higher frequency bands when the subjects walked in RA and SA conditions. Moreover, we found low γ modulations in the sensorimotor area in LW walking and the modulations in this cluster shifted to lower frequency bands in RA and SA walking. These results are a promising step toward the development of a non-invasive Neural-machine Interface (NMI) for locomotion mode recognition.