Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Akihiro Funamizu, Fred Marbach, Anthony M. Zador
Summary: This study investigates how non-sensory context influences the activity of neurons in the auditory cortex. The results show that both stimulus and reward expectation modulate the activity of these neurons, although the auditory cortex does not represent sufficient information about these priors to exploit them optimally.
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Nafiseh Atapour, Katrina H. Worthy, Marcello G. P. Rosa
Summary: The study reports a previously unknown form of thalamocortical plasticity observed in marmoset monkeys following lesions of the primary visual area (V1). The specificity of LGN projections to the cortex is disrupted after long-term V1 lesions, leading to neurochemical and structural remodeling of the circuit. This has potential implications for understanding residual visual abilities after V1 lesions and could inform rehabilitation strategies for cortical blindness.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
(2022)
Article
Neurosciences
Christian Quaia, Incheol Kang, Bruce G. Cumming
Summary: Direction selective neurons in macaque primary visual cortex are narrowly tuned for orientation, but are affected by the aperture problem. In the middle temporal (MT) area, some cells are able to solve this problem and respond to pattern motion direction. This study shows that a pattern motion signal is present at the population level, revealing the diversity of single-cell responses.
JOURNAL OF NEUROSCIENCE
(2022)
Article
Neurosciences
Arijit Chakraborty, Tiffany T. Tran, Andrew E. Silva, Deborah Giaschi, Benjamin Thompson
Summary: Lower level motion processing is crucial for multiple object tracking (MOT), with evidence suggesting that minor disruption of MT+ function alone can lead to deficits in MOT performance.
EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF NEUROSCIENCE
(2021)
Article
Neurosciences
Zhe-Xin Xu, Gregory C. DeAngelis
Summary: There are two sources of retinal image motion: objects moving in the world and observer movement. Neurons in the middle temporal (MT) area combine eye velocity and retinal velocity, potentially through a partial coordinate transformation or a multiplicative gain interaction, to compute head-centered object motion and depth information.
JOURNAL OF NEUROSCIENCE
(2022)
Article
Neurosciences
Or Yizhar, Zohar Tal, Amir Amedi
Summary: The perceptual function of the Extrastriate Body Area (EBA) develops independently of visual experience, while its action-related function depends on visual experience. Congenital blindness alters EBA's connectivity pattern, with decreased functional connectivity with sensorimotor cortices and maintained connectivity with perception-related visual occipital cortices.
FRONTIERS IN NEUROSCIENCE
(2023)
Article
Neurosciences
Thomas Decramer, Elsie Premereur, Qi Zhu, Wim Van Paesschen, Johannes van Loon, Wim Vanduffel, Jessica Taubert, Peter Janssen, Tom Theys
Summary: The study showed that single neurons in the human visual cortex exhibit selective activity for faces, suggesting the importance of neural mechanisms in human face recognition. This provides crucial experimental evidence linking imaging studies in humans and invasive studies in animal models.
JOURNAL OF NEUROSCIENCE
(2021)
Article
Neurosciences
Julia Landsiedel, Katie Daughters, Paul E. Downing, Kami Koldewyn
Summary: This study confirms that bilateral SI-pSTS plays a central role in dynamic social interaction perception, but is less involved when 'interactiveness' is conveyed solely with static cues. Regions in the social brain, including SI-pSTS and EBA, are sensitive to both motion and interactive content. SI-pSTS is somewhat more tuned to video interactions than is EBA, but both regions show a greater response to social interactions compared to non-interactions and both respond more strongly to videos than static images.
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Shinya Takamuku, Hiroaki Gomi
Summary: This study found that the human visual system can maintain self-motion speed by adjusting stride length, regardless of changes in object depths in the scene. The results suggest the presence of a speedometer within the visuomotor system that calculates self-motion speed from vision cues.
Article
Biochemical Research Methods
Udo A. Ernst, Xiao Chen, Lisa Bohnenkamp, Fingal Orlando Galashan, Detlef Wegener
Summary: The brain must be able to process sudden changes in visual scenes independently for quick and reliable detection. Neurons in the motion-selective area MT exhibit complex, non-linear behavior in response to speed changes, driven by temporal dynamics of excitation and divisive inhibition. Attention increases the steepness of the neuronal transient response regardless of the activation state prior to stimulus change, facilitating faster and more reliable reactions to attended events.
PLOS COMPUTATIONAL BIOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Anatomy & Morphology
Valentina Sulpizio, Francesca Strappini, Patrizia Fattori, Gaspare Galati, Claudio Galletti, Anna Pecchinenda, Sabrina Pitzalis
Summary: The human middle-temporal region MT+ is specialized in processing visual motion and can be modulated by extraretinal signals. This study used functional MRI data to investigate the influence of retinal and extraretinal signals on MT+ and the functional connections between its subdivisions. The findings revealed a visuomotor role for anterior areas MST and FST, and a pure visual role for anterior areas MT and V4t in processing coherent visual motion and lower-limb movements.
BRAIN STRUCTURE & FUNCTION
(2022)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Eucharist Kun, Emily M. Javan, Olivia Smith, Faris Gulamali, Javier de la Fuente, Brianna I. Flynn, Kushal Vajrala, Zoe Trutner, Prakash Jayakumar, Elliot M. Tucker-Drob, Mashaal Sohail, Tarjinder Singh, Vagheesh M. Narasimhan
Summary: By using deep-learning models to analyze 31,221 X-rays from the UK Biobank, a comprehensive set of skeletal proportions (SPs) was extracted and linked to 145 independent genetic loci. Limb proportions were found to have strong genetic sharing, but were independent of width and torso proportions. The study also identified specific genetic variants associated with osteoarthritis and hip/knee SPs, and revealed enrichment of SP loci in human accelerated regions and regulatory elements of genes differentially expressed between humans and great apes. This research provides insights into the genetic basis of skeletal form and its connection to human anatomical change and pathogenesis.
Article
Neurosciences
Georgios A. Keliris, Yibin Shao, Michael C. Schmid, Mark Augath, Nikos K. Logothetis, Stelios M. Smirnakis
Summary: In adult macaque monkeys, the higher order visual areas V2/V3 display significant capacity for topographic reorganization following retinal lesions, exceeding the corresponding capacity of area V1. Neurons inside the lesion projection zone (LPZ) reorganize by receiving input from either the fovea or the peripheral border of the LPZ.
FRONTIERS IN NEUROSCIENCE
(2022)
Article
Neurosciences
Giuseppe Marrazzo, Federico De Martino, Agustin Lage-Castellanos, Maarten J. Vaessen, Beatrice de Gelder
Summary: Previous research focused on category-specific representation of body stimuli in the occipitotemporal cortex using fMRI, but the specific computational mechanisms in body selective regions remained unknown. This study used ultra-high field fMRI and banded ridge regression to investigate the coding mechanisms of body images, revealing a combination of low-level visual features and postural features in encoding bodies in the occipitotemporal cortex and the extrastriate body area (EBA).
Article
Computer Science, Interdisciplinary Applications
Pengxiang Xia, Hengxu You, Yang Ye, Jing Du
Summary: This paper proposes a human body motion and hand gesture control method in Virtual Reality (VR) for ROV teleoperation in navigation and stabilization tasks. The proposed method utilizes a whole-body haptic suit and body-carried sensors to convert human body motions into gesture controls for remote ROV operations. Experimental results show improved control precision, reduced mental load, and perceived benefits, which inspire the design of novel ROV teleoperation systems in the future.
COMPUTERS IN INDUSTRY
(2023)
Article
Neurosciences
Jose Sanchez-Bornot, Roberto C. Sotero, J. A. Scott Kelso, Ozguer Simsek, Damien Coyle
Summary: This study proposes a multi-penalized state-space model for analyzing unobserved dynamics, using a data-driven regularization method. Novel algorithms are developed to solve the model, and a cross-validation method is introduced to evaluate regularization parameters. The effectiveness of this method is validated through simulations and real data analysis, enabling a more accurate exploration of cognitive brain functions.