Bereitschaftspotential

In neurology, the Bereitschaftspotential or BP (German for "readiness potential"), also called the pre-motor potential or readiness potential (RP), is a measure of activity in the motor cortex and supplementary motor area of the brain leading up to voluntary muscle movement. The BP is a manifestation of cortical contribution to the pre-motor planning of volitional movement. It was first recorded and reported in 1964 by Hans Helmut Kornhuber and Lüder Deecke at the University of Freiburg in Germany. In 1965 the full publication appeared after many control experiments. In the spring of 1964 Hans Helmut Kornhuber (then docent and chief physician at the department of neurology, head Professor Richard Jung, university hospital Freiburg im Breisgau) and Lüder Deecke (his doctoral student) went for lunch to the 'Gasthaus zum Schwanen' at the foot of the Schlossberg hill in Freiburg. Sitting alone in the beautiful garden they discussed their frustration with the passive brain research prevailing worldwide and their desire to investigate self-initiated action of the brain and the will. Consequently, they decided to look for cerebral potentials in man related to volitional acts and to take voluntary movement as their research paradigm. The possibility to do research on electrical brain potentials preceding voluntary movements came with the advent of the 'computer of average transients' (CAT computer), invented by Manfred Clynes, the first still simple instrument available at that time in the Freiburg laboratory. In the electroencephalogram (EEG) little is to be seen preceding actions, except of an inconstant diminution of the α- (or μ-) rhythm. The young researchers stored the electroencephalogram and electromyogram of self-initiated movements (fast finger flexions) on tape and analyzed the cerebral potentials preceding movements time-reversed with the start of the movement as the trigger, literally turning the tape over for analysis since they had no reversal playback or programmable computer.