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Unraveling multisensory integration: patchy organization within human STS multisensory cortex

Nature Neuroscience volume 7, pages 1190–1192 (2004)Cite this article

Abstract

Although early sensory cortex is organized along dimensions encoded by receptor organs, little is known about the organization of higher areas in which different modalities are integrated. We investigated multisensory integration in human superior temporal sulcus using recent advances in parallel imaging to perform functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) at very high resolution. These studies suggest a functional architecture in which information from different modalities is brought into close proximity via a patchy distribution of inputs, followed by integration in the intervening cortex.

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Figure 1: Patchy organization within the STS-MS.
Figure 2: Reliability of patchy organization within the STS-MS.

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Acknowledgements

We thank C. Senior for providing the face stimuli and R.W. Cox and Z.S. Saad for their continued development of AFNI and SUMA.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Brain and Cognition, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA

    Michael S Beauchamp, Brenna D Argall & Alex Martin

  2. Functional MRI Facility, National Institute of Mental Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA

    Jerzy Bodurka

  3. Section on Advanced MRI, Laboratory of Functional and Molecular Imaging, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA

    Jeff H Duyn

Authors
  1. Michael S Beauchamp
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  2. Brenna D Argall
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  3. Jerzy Bodurka
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  4. Jeff H Duyn
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  5. Alex Martin
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michael S Beauchamp.

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Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Video 1

Example of tool video used as visual stimulus (V) in main experiment. (MPG 330 kb)

Supplementary Video 2

Example of tool recording used as auditory stimulus (A) in main experiment. (MPG 216 kb)

Supplementary Video 3

Example of simultaneous video and recording used as auditory-visual stimulus (AV) in main experiment. (MPG 557 kb)

Supplementary Video 4

Example of face video used as visual stimulus (V) in control experiment. (MPG 1395 kb)

Supplementary Video 5

Example of voice recording used as auditory stimulus (A) in control experiment. (MPG 210 kb)

Supplementary Video 6

Example of simultaneous face video and voice recording used as auditory-visual stimulus (AV) in control experiment. (MPG 1395 kb)

Supplementary Discussion (PDF 29 kb)

Supplementary Methods (PDF 29 kb)

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Beauchamp, M., Argall, B., Bodurka, J. et al. Unraveling multisensory integration: patchy organization within human STS multisensory cortex. Nat Neurosci 7, 1190–1192 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/nn1333

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