Cerebral Cortex, Vol. 13, No. 1, 2-4,
January 2003
© 2003 Oxford University Press
Introduction
Krieger Mind-Brain Institute, Department of Neuroscience, The Johns Hopkins University, 3400 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
Address correspondence to V.B. Mountcastle, Krieger Mind-Brain Institute, Department of Neuroscience, The Johns Hopkins University, 3400 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA. Email: mountcastle@mbi.mb.jhu.edu.
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Every neuroscientist has a list of those he considers the most important unsolved problems in brain science. Surely high on the list of many will be that considered in this issue of Cerebral Cortex. Namely, what are the transforming operations imposed in a local region of neocortex, a cortical column, upon its input to produce its several outputs? The essays included here provide a cross-section of this large field, written by investigators using methods that include Golgi studies, slice recording with multiple intracellular microelectrodes and multiple microelectrode recording in intact cortex; several include theoretical modeling. While no one of these authors would venture that the problem is solved, their contributions and those of others in the field indicate that significant progress has been made in constructing an intra-columnar flow diagram, and in understanding the dynamic neuronal operations within it.
When in 1955–1959 I described the columnar organization of the
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Are Properties Identical For All Neurons in a Minicolumn? |
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Are Minicolumns in Different Cortical Areas All the Same? |
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How Can the Intrinsic Function of the Cortex Be Studied? |
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What Generalizations Can Be Made? |
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