Frontal connections of the medial posterior-parietal cortex in the macaque
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1
University of Bologna, Dipartimento di Farmacia e Biotecnologie, Italy
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2
Monash University, Department of Physiology, Australia
Here we present the frontal connectivity pattern of the medial posterior-parietal cortex in
macaque monkeys, a cortical region that contains the cytoarchitectonically-defined areas V6,
V6Av, V6Ad, and PEc. Area V6 is an extrastriate pure visual area which lies in the fundus of the
parieto-occipital sulcus. The two cytoarchitectonic sectors of V6A and area PEc are visuomotor
areas lying in the caudalmost part of the superior parietal lobule. Contrary to V6, V6A and PEc
receive and elaborate visual and somatosensory signals from the arms (V6A, PEc) and legs (PEc).
Both areas contain arm reaching neurons strongly activated during reach-to-grasp movements. In
the present work, horse-radish peroxidase and retrograde fluorescent tracers were injected within
the cytoarchitectonic limits of areas V6, V6Av, V6Ad, PEc in 16 cynomolgus monkeys (Macaca
fascicularis). No labeled cells were found in the frontal lobe after V6 injections and a few cells,
confined within frontal eye fields and dorsal premotor area F7, were found after V6Av injections.
Tracer injections in V6Ad resulted in a main projection originating from area F2 and a weaker
projection originating from F7. After PEc injections, the large majority of labelled cells in the
frontal lobe were found in area F2, with fewer cells in F1 and F3. About 75% of F2 projection cells
were in the part of the area representing the leg. The remaining 25% were located in the visually
responsive ventro-rostral portion of F2, the same part of F2 which is connected with V6Ad. If we
take into account the relative emphasis of leg-field projections to PEc and of arm-field projections
to the adjacent V6Ad, it could be suggested that the caudal pole of the superior parietal lobule,
taken as a whole, contains the neuronal machinery to help control in locomotion and coordinated
limb movements in the environment.
Grants: FP7-ICT 217077-EYESHOTS, MIUR, Fondazione del Monte di Bologna e Ravenna.
Keywords:
frontal cortex,
Posterior parietal cortex,
connections,
superior parietal lobule (SPL),
visuo-motor control
Conference:
4th Conference of the Mediterrarnean Neuroscience Society, Istanbul, Türkiye, 30 Sep - 3 Oct, 2012.
Presentation Type:
Poster Presentation
Topic:
Abstracts
Citation:
Galletti
C,
Gamberini
M,
Passarelli
L,
Bakola
S and
Fattori
P
(2013). Frontal connections of the medial posterior-parietal cortex in the macaque.
Conference Abstract:
4th Conference of the Mediterrarnean Neuroscience Society.
doi: 10.3389/conf.fnhum.2013.210.00034
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Received:
28 Jan 2013;
Published Online:
11 Apr 2013.
*
Correspondence:
Prof. Claudio Galletti, University of Bologna, Dipartimento di Farmacia e Biotecnologie, bologna, 40127, Italy, claudio.galletti@unibo.it