Dr. Antonella Palla

 

Main Goals, Keywords

To study central vestibular diseases affecting motion perception, spatial orientation and navigation in humans and to assess potential treatments.

Keywords: neurology, neuro-otology, spatial orientation, vestibular pathways, self-motion perception, humans, cortex

Group Members

1 group leader, 2 doctoral students

Previous and Current Research

The long-term goal of this research is to better understand diseases affecting motion perception, spatial orientation and navigation in humans and to assess potential treatments. The focus of interest is on how vestibular signals are processed and represented at cortical level. While our previous work has concentrated on ocular motor responses upon various types of vestibular stimulations, we now aim to elucidate the central mechanisms of vestibular self-motion encoding in patients with neurological disorders that asymmetrically affect neural structures of the central vestibular system (e.g. strokes).

Future Projects

We plan to use repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation to modify the activity of vestibular cortical areas in order to better understand the properties and functions of these specific areas.

Techniques and Equipment

This research uses techniques for vestibular (motion simulator, multi-axis turntable), eye movement recordings (dual search coil technique, 3D video-oculography), and psychophysical instruments (tachometer wheel for subjective velocity perception, somatosensory bar for translational and tilt relative to gravity perception).

Selected Publications

• Bertolini G, Palla A, Ramat S. Fitting rVOR responses using current models. Conf Proc IEEE Eng Med Biol Soc. 3259-62 (2009).
• Palla, A., Tatalias, M., Straumann, D. Hysteresis effects of the subjective visual vertical during continuous quasi-static whole-body roll rotation. Prog Brain Res 171;271-5 (2008).

Funding

Swiss National Science Foundation; Betty and David Koetser Foundation for Brain Research, Baasch-Medicus Stiftung