Article abstract


Nature Neuroscience 10, 657 - 662 (2007)
Published online: 1 April 2007 | doi:10.1038/nn1879

Human visual cortex responds to invisible chromatic flicker

Yi Jiang1, Ke Zhou2 & Sheng He1


When two isoluminant colors alternate at frequencies of 25 Hz or higher, observers perceive only one fused color. Chromatic flicker beyond the fusion frequency induces flicker adaptation in human observers and stimulates monkey V1 neurons. Here we use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to show that many human visual cortical areas, with the exception of VO, can distinguish between fused chromatic flicker and its matched nonflickering control. This result supports the existence of significant intracortical temporal filtering of high-frequency chromatic information. The result also suggests that a considerable difference in cortical activation in many visual cortical areas does not necessarily lead to different conscious experiences.

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  1. Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, 75 E. River Rd., Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455, USA
  2. State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Science, Graduate School and Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 15 Datun Road, Beijing 100101, China

Correspondence to: Sheng He1 e-mail: sheng@umn.edu

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