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Eye Velocity Gain Fields in the Medial Superior Temporal Cortex

Lukas Brostek1*, Ulrich Büttner2, Michael J. Mustari3 and Stefan Glasauer1, 2
  • 1 BCCN Munich, Germany
  • 2 LMU Munich, Integrated Center for Research and Treatment of Vertigo, Germany
  • 3 University of Washington, Washington National Primate Research Center, United States

Lesion studies have shown the involvement of the Medial Superior Temporal cortex (MST) in the generation of optokinetic eye movements (Dürsteler and Wurtz, 1988). Most of the neurons in this cortical area show activity when presented with a moving large-field visual stimulus. This visual response is modulated by eye movements (Bradley et al., 1996). However, the exact interaction between the retinal image velocity and the eye velocity signals is not yet fully understood. Using a novel information-theoretic approach for determining neuronal tuning functions (Brostek et al., 2011), we show that the majority of MSTd neurons exhibits Gain Field-like tuning functions The degree of modulation of the visual response by eye velocity differed across the population. These physiological findings were reflected by emergent properties of intermediate layer units of a neural network model trained to perform coordinate transformation. MSTd Gain Fields may thus constitute an intermediate step for transforming retinal image velocity to a head- or space-centered stimulus velocity signal.

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research Grants 01GQ0440 (BCCN), 01EO0901 (IFB), and National Institutes of Health Grants EY06069, RR000166.

References

Bradley, D. C., Maxwell, M., Andersen, R. A., Banks, M. S., and Shenoy, K. V. (1996). Mechanisms of Heading Perception in Primate Visual Cortex. Science 273, 1544 –1547.
Brostek, L., Eggert, T., Ono, S., Mustari, M. J., Büttner, U., and Glasauer, S. (2011). An Information-Theoretic Approach for Evaluating Probabilistic Tuning Functions of Single Neurons. Front Comput Neurosci 5.
Dürsteler, M. R., and Wurtz, R. H. (1988). Pursuit and optokinetic deficits following chemical lesions of cortical areas MT and MST. J Neurophysiol 60, 940–965.

Keywords: Coordinate transformation, Gain field, MST, Optokinetic Response

Conference: Bernstein Conference 2012, Munich, Germany, 12 Sep - 14 Sep, 2012.

Presentation Type: Poster

Topic: Motor control, movement, navigation

Citation: Brostek L, Büttner U, Mustari MJ and Glasauer S (2012). Eye Velocity Gain Fields in the Medial Superior Temporal Cortex. Front. Comput. Neurosci. Conference Abstract: Bernstein Conference 2012. doi: 10.3389/conf.fncom.2012.55.00180

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Received: 11 May 2012; Published Online: 12 Sep 2012.

* Correspondence: Mr. Lukas Brostek, BCCN Munich, München, Germany, Lukas.Brostek@lrz.uni-muenchen.de