Exploring Cerebral and Cerebellar Blood Oxygenation-Level Dependent Activations during Visually Cued Alternating Hand and Foot Movements with 3T Multiband fMRI

In this study, we aimed to elicit cerebellar activity using a visually cued task involving alternating button presses and foot pedaling at varying speeds. Functional MRI data were acquired using a multiband sequence on a 3T scanner. Thirty-three healthy volunteers participated, and their blood oxygen-level dependent (BOLD) signals were recorded at a spatial resolution of 1.6 × 1.6 × 2.5 mm 3 . The fMRI data were analyzed using a general linear model (GLM) to delineate brain regions activated by the button press and foot pedaling conditions, respectively. The BOLD signal changes in each active region of interest (ROI) were then linearly regressed against the mean reaction times (RTs), with age as a covariate, for all participants. All ROIs exhibited a negative relationship with RTs, indicating that higher BOLD activations were associated with faster responses across all conditions. Interestingly, the button press task significantly activated the pyramis (inferior cerebellar vermis), whereas the foot pedaling task activated the superior cerebellar vermis. This finding reflects a functional segmentation along the superior-inferior axis of the cerebellar vermis, corresponding to a foot-to-hand distribution. Using multiband fMRI, we achieved the spatial resolution necessary to delineate this functional topography within the cerebellum.