Motor-skill learning is associated with the stabilization and an increase in co-ordination of neural activity between the brain areas involved, such as the primary motor cortex (M1) and dorsolateral striatum (DLS). However, the effect of learning on information transfer between these areas is not well understood, with apparently contradicting findings regarding the importance of M1 input to DLS during learning.

Lemke and colleagues have now investigated how skill-specific information is encoded and exchanged between M1 and DLS — which form a reciprocally connected loop — during reach-to-grasp skill learning in rats. By monitoring neural activity in these areas during the progression from naive movement to skilled movement in the task, they found that M1 and DLS differentially encode general information and information specifically relevant to the task. Indeed, although there was no directional change in overall neural activity during the skill-learning process (strengthening in both directions between M1 and DLS), the relative timing of information coding across regions indicated that the main direction of behaviourally relevant information flow switched from M1→DLS before learning to DLS→M1 after the skill learning.