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311-318,1990 0003-9969/90
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Printed in Great Britain. A.11rights reserved Copyright p 1990Pergamon Press plc
Summary-Nine adults with no orofacial dysfunctions were instructed to chew a standardized piece of
soft or hard gum on the right side in time with a metronome set at 46, 100 or 160 beats/min. Jaw
movements were recorded with a Myotronics kinesiograph and masseter electromyograms were detected
with surface elelztrodes. The chewing patterns on either gum were not significantly different in any of their
spatial or temporal aspects, in mean or peak opening or closing velocities, or in the timing or level of
activity in either masseter at any of the three chewing frequencies. These findings suggest that during
metronome-paced chewing the change in sensory feedback resulting from a change in gum hardness exerts
little or no effel:t on either the spatial or temporal aspects of masticatory motor output.
Key words: chewing pattern, spatial and temporal aspects of chewing, jaw velocities, metronome-paced
chewing, bolus texture, mast&tory motor c&o1
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46 100 160 46 100 160
600
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Fig. 4. Group means for the total cycle duration, and for the opening, closing and occlusal phases for
the 9 subjects while chewing soft (open bars) and hard (hatched bars) gum at the 3 metronome settings.
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one subject. At each metronome setting, the burst
a 200 duration of the non-working muscle (i.e. contra-
lateral to the bolus) was longer than that of the
working muscle. Other subjects showed a similar
I I I I pattern, but the differences between the group means
20 40 for burst duration of the 2 masseter muscles were not
Mean statistically significant at any chewing frequency.
Burst durations of both masseter muscles were
shortened in proportion to the shortening of the total
cycle duration when chewing was paced at 100 or 160
beats/min. In fact, masseter activity filled the same
proportion of each chewing cycle regardless of the
absolute total cycle duration, as pointed out by Plesh
et al. (1987). A change in gum hardness had no
significant effect on the masseters’ burst duration at
any of the chewing frequencies.
Onset latencies. The absolute value of onset latency
for the working masseter varied markedly among
I I I I subjects at every chewing frequency (Fig. 9). Mean
0 40 80 onset latencies on soft gum were not different from
Mean those on hard gum. With each increment in chewing
Fig. 6. Upper panel: peak versus mean opening velocities for frequency, onset latencies become significantly
all data. Lower panel: peak versus mean closing velocities shorter. In some subjects [e.g. No. 3 (open triangle),
for all data. No. 4 (filled triangle) and No. 6 (filled square)], when
chewing at 160 beats/min, the masseter became active
velocity exceeds the ‘mean closing velocity only five- prior to jaw closing. In all other cases masseter
fold. activity started after the start of jaw closing showing
As shown by the data in Fig. 7, mean closing that the masseter muscles do not initiate closing.
velocity was always higher than mean opening veloc- Masseter electromyogram activity. Figure 10 shows
ity, but peak closing and peak opening velocities were the mean peak amplitudes and the mean rise times of
not different. the integrated electromyograms from the working
masseter muscle for each subject. There was wide
inter-subject variability for each response. A two-
way, within-subject ANOVA revealed no significant
differences between group means for the 2 gums for
either the peak amplitudes or the rise times. Thus,
neither a change in chewing frequency nor a change
in gum hardness caused a predictable change in the
level or timing of recruitment in the masseter muscles.
600
0 soft gum
r
;; 500 m Non-workmg
t
z Mean dosing velocity (mm /s )
46 100 l&O
Metronome setting
g
!?! Oo% 2bo 3bo 4bo 5do
(beats/min)
Peak dosing velocity (mm 1s) Fig. 8. Mean burst durations of masseter activity in the
Fig. 7. Upper panel: mean opening versus mean closing working (open bars) and non-working (solid bars) muscles
velocity. Lower panel: peak opening versus peak closing of subject No. 1 when chewing the soft and hard gums in
velocity. Lines of identity are shown. time with the 3 metronome settings.
316 B. BISHOP et al.
‘-E- VI 225
: E 600 c F
Fig. 9. Mean onset latencies for the right (i.e. working) masseter muscle while chewing hard and soft gums
at the 3 metronome settings. Symbols as in Fig. 1.
Fig. 10. Upper panel: mean peak amplitudes of the integrated electromyograms (in arbitary units, AU)
recorded from the right masseter muscle during chewing hard gum versus those while chewing soft gum
on the right side in time with the metronome. Lower panel: analogous plots for mean rise times of the
integrated electromyograms. Symbols as in Fig. I.
Metronome-paced chewing patterns 317
questions. Metronome-paced chewing imposes a con- activation. The fact that the nervous system can
straint on the duration of jaw movements; automatic activate the same muscles using different components
chewing does not. Does one neuronal network serve of the central motor system shows that different
both tasks? If so, the peripheral influences must be motor systems converge on the same motor pools
‘gated’ during metronome-paced chewing. Perhaps (Chez, 1985). Perhaps direct corticotrigeminal path-
the same neural mechanisms are used differently in ways from the motor cortex converge on premotor
the 2 tasks. neurones that may or may not be components of the
During automatic chewing the rhythmicity and masticatory pattern generators in order to exert
mandibular trajectory are controlled by central pat- control over voluntary jaw movements. No informa-
tern generators in the brain stem and pontomedullary tion is at present available on this point.
region of the medial reticular formation (Chandler Nearly a century ago, Hughlings Jackson proposed
and Goldberg, 1982; Enomoto, Katakura and Naka- different hierarchical levels of motor control (Jack-
mura, 1983; Katoh er al., 1982; Kubo et al., 1981; son, 1931). The highest levels involve the prefrontal
Nakamura and Kubo, 1978; Nozaki, Iriki and Naka- cortex, the middle levels involve the pre- and post-
mura, 1986). Whether metronome-paced chewing central (i.e. the primary sensorimotor) cortex, and
and automatic chewing use the central pattern gener- the lowest levels mediating automatic control involve
ators in identical ways remains to be determined. the brain stem, the spinal cord or both. Lund et al.
During metronome-paced chewing the subject is (1984) have speculated that “alterations in the level
required to control his jaw movements at rates below, of cortical activity appear to be capable of changing
close to and above the set point used for automatic specific components of the chewing pattern”.
chewing. The descending motor command for this Although high-level cortical influences may play a
task could exert its control over the masticatory role in automatic chewing, they are not essential, as
effecters by way of the central pattern generators, so shown by rhythmical jaw movements in decerebrate
ignoring intra-oral feedback, or possibly the central preparations (Thexton, Griffiths and McGarrick,
pattern generators are by-passed with the motor 1980) and in ancephalic infants (Monnier and Willi,
commands being conducted directly to the final com- 1947).
mon pathway (i.e. the trigeminal motoneurones in the In our experiments, with each resetting of the
nucleus of V). metronome, subjects had to change their chewing rate
Rhythmical jaw movements can be induced by to keep jaw movements paced to the auditory signal.
mechanical or electrical stimuli applied to the lips of This limitation imposed by movement rate made it
the decerebrate rat pup (Thexton and Griffiths, 1979), unpredictable which way a subject would alter their
by electrical stimulation of the masticatory area of jaw movement to satisfy the constraint. Some
the cerebral cortex in various animals (Chandler, subjects retained gape and altered velocity, others
Goldberg and Lambert, 1985; Lund and Dellow, reduced gape while maintaining velocity (see exam-
1971; Lund, Rossignol and Murakami, 1981; Naka- ples in Fig. 2). Regardless of the strategy selected, the
mura et al., 1976; Nozaki et al., 1986; Sumi, 1969, duration of every phase in the chewing cycle was
1977), or by non-rhythmical repetitive stimulation of altered with an alteration in chewing frequency and
the pontine pyramid.al tract in the isolated brain stem the magnitudes of these alterations in phase durations
of the guinea pig (Nozaki et al., 1986) or decerebrate were independent of the gum’s hardness. We assume
rabbit (Lund and Dellow, 1971). During cortical that this reflects a cerebral resetting of the central
stimulation in the cat (Kubo ez al., 1981; Nakamuro motor command.
and Kubo, 1978) or guinea pig, jaw-closer moto- Our findings do not negate the importance of
neurones undergo alternating excitatory and in- peripheral feedback during metronome-paced
hibitory phases, whereas jaw-opener motoneurones chewing. In fact, we have shown previously that
undergo only rhythmical excitatory phases (Chandler cycle-to-cycle variability in all chewing parameters is
and Goldberg, 1982). Transection of the brain stem significantly less during metronome-paced chewing
at the pontobulbar junction abolishes rhythmical than during automatic chewing (Plesh et al., 1988).
masticatory activity in the masseter motoneurones This suggests that peripheral feedback serves the
(Enomoto et al., 1983), whereas cortical excitatory important function of resisting fluctuations in
effects on masseter motoneurones persist (Enomoto chewing performance (Goodwin and Luschei, 1974;
et al., 1983; Katoh et al., 1982). These observations Thexton, Hiiemae and Crompton, 1980; Lund and
suggest that the cortex has access to the masseter Olsson, 1983).
motoneurones both directly and by way of the central Our data thus show that an alteration in peripheral
pattern generators. feedback has little or no effect on metronome-paced
Lund et al. (1984.) have demonstrated that at least chewing. The exact neural networks involved in such
three different forms of mastication (incisal gnawing, chewing remain to be defined. They are no doubt also
vertical mastication, and the ruminatory type) are involved in other voluntarily controlled jaw move-
represented in separate zones of the rabbit sensori- ments including speaking, shouting, singing and
motor cortex. These masticatory forms, first defined laughing. If this assumption is correct, then it appears
by Bremer in 1923, are assumed to be generated by that the neural circuitry controlling voluntary
brain-stem circuits in a way analogous to that mandibular movements is less affected by peripheral
produced by spinal circuits for scratching, walking feedback than that involved in the control of auto-
and galloping. Thus, brain-stem neural circuitry sub- matic chewing.
serving the masticatory rhythm generators appears to
be endowed with considerable versatility depending Acknowledgement-This study was supported by NIDR
upon the cortical zone from which they receive Grant DE-06717.
318 B. BISHOPet al.