Striate cortex articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    The neural mechanisms underpinning visual illusions remains poorly understood. Here, the authors recorded the neural responses of mouse primary visual cortex to illusory grating and found delayed responses to illusory brightness, showing that optogenetic inhibition of higher visual areas reduced V1 response to illusions but not to real gratings.

    • Alireza Saeedi
    • , Kun Wang
    •  & Masataka Watanabe

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Whether visual illusions and mental imagery are similarly represented in visual cortex is not well understood. Here, the authors show that imagery content is mainly detectable in deep layers of V1, whereas illusory content is decodable mainly from superficial layers.

    • Johanna Bergmann
    • , Lucy S. Petro
    •  & Lars Muckli

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The visual cortex adapts innate behaviors through its corticofugal projections to the brainstem. Here, authors show that this pathway sends unique brainstem neurons distinct behaviorally relevant signals, whose strength can plastically change to promote behavioral adaptation.

    • Jiashu Liu
    • , Yingtian He
    •  & Bao-hua Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    It is unclear whether human visual cortex exhibits representational drift. Here, the authors test the stability of visual representations and find that responsivity drifts over time, yet dissimilarities remain stable, suggesting a neural mechanism to overcome cumulative changes.

    • Zvi N. Roth
    •  & Elisha P. Merriam

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Studying visual processing during natural eye movements in untrained animals is challenging. Here, the authors provide a method for accurately measuring the retinal input to study visual processing and neural selectivity during natural oculomotor behavior in non-human primates.

    • Jacob L. Yates
    • , Shanna H. Coop
    •  & Jude F. Mitchell

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Accurately capturing the tuning variability directly from the noisy neural responses is an important and challenging issue. Here, the authors introduce an unsupervised statistical approach to decomposing tuning variability, leading to a simple and unifying rule of tuning modulation in V1.

    • Rong J. B. Zhu
    •  & Xue-Xin Wei

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Whether orientation-selectivity is discernable via fMRI remains unclear. Here, by analyzing a public dataset of responses to natural scenes using neurally-inspired image-computable models, the authors isolate and characterize a coarse-scale orientation map and demonstrate that orientation-selective BOLD responses reflect multiple distinct computations at a range of spatial scales.

    • Zvi N. Roth
    • , Kendrick Kay
    •  & Elisha P. Merriam

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Face stimuli that are perceived as emotionally expressive rather than neutral are associated with specific neural responses in V1. Here the authors show that valence information perceived from facial expressions is computed in the amygdala and fed back to V1 via direct anatomical projections.

    • Tina T. Liu
    • , Jason Z Fu
    •  & Elisha P. Merriam

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Neurons in the early visual system respond preferentially to the onset or offset of light. Here the authors show that ON/OFF responses cluster in the mouse primary visual cortex, shaping the receptive fields of cortical cells.

    • Elaine Tring
    • , Konnie K. Duan
    •  & Dario L. Ringach

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Najafian et al. introduce a developmental theory of map formation in the cerebral cortex. The theory proposes that increases in the density of thalamic afferents sampling sensory space make cortical maps to segregate more stimulus dimensions.

    • Sohrab Najafian
    • , Erin Koch
    •  & Jose-Manuel Alonso

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In humans, stroke damage to V1 causes large visual field defects. Spared V1 activity prior to training predicts the amount of training-induced recovery in luminance detection sensitivity. Moreover, visual training changes population receptive field properties within residual V1 circuits.

    • Antoine Barbot
    • , Anasuya Das
    •  & Krystel R. Huxlin

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Many behaviours depend on predictions about the environment. Here the authors find neural populations in primary visual cortex to straighten the temporal trajectories of natural video clips, facilitating the extrapolation of past observations.

    • Olivier J. Hénaff
    • , Yoon Bai
    •  & Robbe L. T. Goris

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In the cerebral cortex, information is processed by multiple hierarchically organized areas, reciprocally connected via feedforward and feedback circuits. Here the authors show that in primate visual cortex, feedforward projection neurons receive monosynaptic feedback contacts selectively from the area to which they project.

    • Caitlin Siu
    • , Justin Balsor
    •  & Alessandra Angelucci

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The relative roles of visual, parietal, and frontal cortex in working memory have been actively debated. Here, the authors show that distraction impacts visual working memory representations in primary visual areas, indicating that these regions play a key role in the maintenance of working memory.

    • Grace E. Hallenbeck
    • , Thomas C. Sprague
    •  & Clayton E. Curtis

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The representation of space in mouse visual cortex was considered to be relatively uniform. The authors show that mice have improved visual resolution in a cortical region representing a location in space directly in front and slightly above them, showing that the representation of space in mouse visual cortex is non-uniform.

    • Enny H. van Beest
    • , Sreedeep Mukherjee
    •  & Matthew W. Self

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The neural sampling theory suggests that neuronal variability encodes the uncertainty of probabilistic inferences. This paper shows that response variability in primary visual cortex reflects the statistical structure of visual inputs, as required for inferences correctly tuned to the statistics of the natural environment.

    • Dylan Festa
    • , Amir Aschner
    •  & Ruben Coen-Cagli

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Two-photon imaging in macaque V1 captured maps of tuning selectivity for four spatial parameters, all of which correlated with peak spatial frequency. These inter-map relationships reveal a common motif—they are described by uniform spatial pooling from a family of scale invariant Gabor receptive fields.

    • Y. Chen
    • , H. Ko
    •  & I. Nauhaus

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The visual callosal pathway reciprocally connects mammalian visual cortices and is proposed to facilitate activation of binocular neurons. Here, the authors show that this pathway facilitates responses in both monocular and binocular neurons but these responses are gated by the ipsilateral lateral geniculate nucleus.

    • Vishnudev Ramachandra
    • , Verena Pawlak
    •  & Jason N. D. Kerr

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Visual features are streamed into higher visual areas (HVAs), but how representations in HVAs are built, based on retinal output channels, is unknown. Here, the authors show that specific connectivity of cortical neurons routes retina-originated direction-selective signaling into distinct HVAs.

    • Rune Rasmussen
    • , Akihiro Matsumoto
    •  & Keisuke Yonehara

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Extensive research in primates shows that attention to space improves behavioural performance as well as neural responses to stimuli in that location. Here, the authors establish a visual spatial attention task in mice and report on attentional modulation of behaviour, as well as neural correlates from subthreshold responses in single cells to spikes and LFP at network level.

    • Anderson Speed
    • , Joseph Del Rosario
    •  & Bilal Haider

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Attention is known to enhance relevant information in our environment, yet its underlying neural computations remain unclear. Here, the authors provide evidence that the degree to which a neural population can normalize itself results in greater potential for attentional benefits.

    • Ilona M. Bloem
    •  & Sam Ling

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Cortical responses are highly heterogeneous, making it difficult to describe how they behave as a population. Here, the author overcomes this problem by introducing a geometric approach to study the representation of orientation and its transformation under the presence of a mask.

    • Dario L. Ringach

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Sensory systems produce stable stimulus representations despite constant changes across multiple stimulus dimensions. Here, the authors reveal dynamic neural coding mechanisms by testing how coding of one dimension (orientation) changes with adaptations to other dimensions (luminance and contrast).

    • Masoud Ghodrati
    • , Elizabeth Zavitz
    •  & Nicholas S. C. Price

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Attention reduces correlated variability in population activity, however the effect of fluctuations in attentional state has not been studied. Here, the authors report in a novel visual task that fluctuations in attentional allocation have a pronounced effect on correlated variability at longer timescales.

    • George H. Denfield
    • , Alexander S. Ecker
    •  & Andreas S. Tolias

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Feedback modulation of V1 is implicated in functions such as attention yet the precise neural mechanisms are not known. Here the authors report that optogenetic inactivation of V2 projections leads to modulation of V1 receptive field properties such as size, surround suppression and response amplitude.

    • Lauri Nurminen
    • , Sam Merlin
    •  & Alessandra Angelucci

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Population receptive fields (pRFs) in the visual system are key information-processors, but how they develop is unknown. Here, authors use fMRI and pRF modeling in children and adults to show that in the ventral stream only pRFs in face- and word-selective regions continue to develop, mirroring changes in viewing behavior.

    • Jesse Gomez
    • , Vaidehi Natu
    •  & Kalanit Grill-Spector

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Neocortical circuits exhibit diverse cell types that can be difficult to build into computational models. Here the authors employ a genetic algorithm-based parameter optimization to generate multi-compartment Hodgkin-Huxley models for diverse cell types in the Allen Cell Types Database.

    • Nathan W. Gouwens
    • , Jim Berg
    •  & Anton Arkhipov

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Single-cell characterization and perturbation of neurons is critical for revealing the structure-function relationship of brain cells. Here the authors develop a robot that performs single-cell electroporation and extracellular electrophysiology and can be used for performingin vivosingle-cell experiments in deep brain tissues optically difficult to access.

    • Lu Li
    • , Benjamin Ouellette
    •  & Hongkui Zeng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Stimulus orientation in the primary visual cortex of primates and carnivores is mapped into a geometrical mosaic but the functional implications of these maps remain debated. Here the authors reveal an association between the structure of cortical orientation maps in cats, and the functions of local cortical circuits in processing patterns and contours.

    • Erin Koch
    • , Jianzhong Jin
    •  & Qasim Zaidi

  • Article |

    Calorie restriction has been associated with increased life span and delayed decline of memory in animals, suggesting a role in neuronal plasticity. In this study, food restriction is demonstrated to enhance plasticity in the central nervous system and trigger the recovery from ocular deprivation in adulthood.

    • Maria Spolidoro
    • , Laura Baroncelli
    •  & Lamberto Maffei

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