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Wolfgang H. R. Miltner

Bio: Wolfgang H. R. Miltner is an academic researcher from University of Jena. The author has contributed to research in topics: Functional magnetic resonance imaging & Insula. The author has an hindex of 56, co-authored 198 publications receiving 13265 citations. Previous affiliations of Wolfgang H. R. Miltner include National Institutes of Health & Schiller International University.


Papers
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The error-related negativity is the manifestation of the activity of a generic neural system involved in error detection, and the distribution of the scalp potential was consistent with a local source in the anterior cingulate cortex or a more distributed sources in the supplementary motor areas.
Abstract: We examined scalp-recorded event-related potentials following feedback stimuli in a time-estimation task. Six hundred msec after indicating the end of a 1 sec interval, subjects received a visual, auditory, or somatosensory stimulus that indicated whether the interval they had produced was correct. Following feedback indicating incorrect performance, a negative deflection occurred, whose characteristics corresponded closely to those of the component (the error-related negativity) that accompanies errors in choice reaction time tasks. Furthermore, equivalent dipole analysis suggested that, for all three modalities, the distribution of the scalp potential was consistent with a local source in the anterior cingulate cortex or a more distributed source in the supplementary motor areas. These loci correspond closely to those described previously for the error-related negativity. We conclude that the error-related negativity is the manifestation of the activity of a “generic” neural system involved in error detection.

1,423 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
01 Jun 2000-Stroke
TL;DR: This is the first demonstration in humans of a long-term alteration in brain function associated with a therapy-induced improvement in the rehabilitation of movement after neurological injury.
Abstract: Background and Purpose—Injury-induced cortical reorganization is a widely recognized phenomenon. In contrast, there is almost no information on treatment-induced plastic changes in the human brain. The aim of the present study was to evaluate reorganization in the motor cortex of stroke patients that was induced with an efficacious rehabilitation treatment. Methods—We used focal transcranial magnetic stimulation to map the cortical motor output area of a hand muscle on both sides in 13 stroke patients in the chronic stage of their illness before and after a 12-day-period of constraint-induced movement therapy. Results—Before treatment, the cortical representation area of the affected hand muscle was significantly smaller than the contralateral side. After treatment, the muscle output area size in the affected hemisphere was significantly enlarged, corresponding to a greatly improved motor performance of the paretic limb. Shifts of the center of the output map in the affected hemisphere suggested the recru...

1,390 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
04 Feb 1999-Nature
TL;DR: It is found that another measure, gamma-band coherence, increases between regions of the brain that receive the two classes of stimuli involved in an associative-learning procedure in humans, which could fulfil the criteria required for the formation of hebbian cell assemblies.
Abstract: Different regions of the brain must communicate with each other to provide the basis for the integration of sensory information, sensory-motor coordination and many other functions that are critical for learning, memory, information processing, perception and the behaviour of organisms. Hebb suggested that this is accomplished by the formation of assemblies of cells whose synaptic linkages are strengthened whenever the cells are activated or 'ignited' synchronously. Hebb's seminal concept has intrigued investigators since its formulation, but the technology to demonstrate its existence had been lacking until the past decade. Previous studies have shown that very fast electroencephalographic activity in the gamma band (20-70 Hz) increases during, and may be involved in, the formation of percepts and memory, linguistic processing, and other behavioural and perceptual functions. We show here that increased gamma-band activity is also involved in associative learning. In addition, we find that another measure, gamma-band coherence, increases between regions of the brain that receive the two classes of stimuli involved in an associative-learning procedure in humans. An increase in coherence could fulfil the criteria required for the formation of hebbian cell assemblies, binding together parts of the brain that must communicate with one another in order for associative learning to take place. In this way, coherence may be a signature for this and other types of learning.

824 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Even in chronic stroke patients, reduced motor cortex representations of an affected body part can be enlarged and increased in level of excitability by an effective rehabilitation procedure, demonstrating a CNS correlate of therapy-induced recovery of function after nervous system damage in humans.

717 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
01 Mar 1999-Stroke
TL;DR: Results replicate in Germany the findings with CI therapy in an American laboratory, suggesting that the intervention has general applicability.
Abstract: Background and Purpose—Constraint-induced movement therapy (CI therapy) has previously been shown to produce large improvements in actual amount of use of a more affected upper extremity in the “re...

579 citations


Cited by
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: With adequate recognition and effective engagement of all issues, BCI systems could eventually provide an important new communication and control option for those with motor disabilities and might also give those without disabilities a supplementary control channel or a control channel useful in special circumstances.

6,803 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Two computational modeling studies are reported, serving to articulate the conflict monitoring hypothesis and examine its implications, including a feedback loop connecting conflict monitoring to cognitive control, and a number of important behavioral phenomena.
Abstract: A neglected question regarding cognitive control is how control processes might detect situations calling for their involvement. The authors propose here that the demand for control may be evaluated in part by monitoring for conflicts in information processing. This hypothesis is supported by data concerning the anterior cingulate cortex, a brain area involved in cognitive control, which also appears to respond to the occurrence of conflict. The present article reports two computational modeling studies, serving to articulate the conflict monitoring hypothesis and examine its implications. The first study tests the sufficiency of the hypothesis to account for brain activation data, applying a measure of conflict to existing models of tasks shown to engage the anterior cingulate. The second study implements a feedback loop connecting conflict monitoring to cognitive control, using this to simulate a number of important behavioral phenomena.

6,385 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Various findings are reviewed in relation to the idea that ACC is a part of a circuit involved in a form of attention that serves to regulate both cognitive and emotional processing, and how the success of this regulation in controlling responses might be correlated with cingulate size.

5,824 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A wide variety of data on capacity limits suggesting that the smaller capacity limit in short-term memory tasks is real is brought together and a capacity limit for the focus of attention is proposed.
Abstract: Miller (1956) summarized evidence that people can remember about seven chunks in short-term memory (STM) tasks. How- ever, that number was meant more as a rough estimate and a rhetorical device than as a real capacity limit. Others have since suggested that there is a more precise capacity limit, but that it is only three to five chunks. The present target article brings together a wide vari- ety of data on capacity limits suggesting that the smaller capacity limit is real. Capacity limits will be useful in analyses of information processing only if the boundary conditions for observing them can be carefully described. Four basic conditions in which chunks can be identified and capacity limits can accordingly be observed are: (1) when information overload limits chunks to individual stimulus items, (2) when other steps are taken specifically to block the recoding of stimulus items into larger chunks, (3) in performance discontinuities caused by the capacity limit, and (4) in various indirect effects of the capacity limit. Under these conditions, rehearsal and long-term memory cannot be used to combine stimulus items into chunks of an unknown size; nor can storage mechanisms that are not capacity- limited, such as sensory memory, allow the capacity-limited storage mechanism to be refilled during recall. A single, central capacity limit averaging about four chunks is implicated along with other, noncapacity-limited sources. The pure STM capacity limit expressed in chunks is distinguished from compound STM limits obtained when the number of separately held chunks is unclear. Reasons why pure capacity estimates fall within a narrow range are discussed and a capacity limit for the focus of attention is proposed.

5,677 citations