Neuroimaging of Tactile Information Processing

ABSTRACT

Neural processing of tactile information in the brain has been relatively less unveiled compared to other senses, such as visual and auditory information. This is partly due to difficulties in creating tactile stimuli, a wide distribution of tactile receptors over the whole body, the lack of rich understanding of tactile perception, and tight coupling of tactile sensation with action. Nonetheless, it is important to understand how the central nervous system processes tactile information in order to develop clinical solutions for impairment of somatosensory systems, create artificial tactile systems for robots, and advance the assistive technology based on perception-action coupling for the elderly. In this review, we revisit recent investigations of neural processing of tactile information in the human brain using neuroimaging. In particular, this review focuses on cutaneous innocuous tactile information.