Skip Navigation



Cerebral Cortex Advance Access published online on May 24, 2006
Cerebral Cortex, doi:10.1093/cercor/bhk043
This Article
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
17/4/885    most recent
bhk043v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Li, D.-P.
Right arrow Articles by Wang, S.-R.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Li, D.-P.
Right arrow Articles by Wang, S.-R.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author 2006. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Article

Feedforward Construction of the Receptive Field and Orientation Selectivity of Visual Neurons in the Pigeon

Da-Peng Li 1, Qian Xiao 1, and Shu-Rong Wang 1 *

1 Laboratory for Visual Information Processing, State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, People's Republic of China

* To whom correspondence should be addressed.
Shu-Rong Wang, E-mail: wangsr{at}sun5.ibp.ac.cn


  Abstract

How the receptive field (RF) of visual cells is formed and how to explain the orientation selectivity have been intensely studied and debated. Here we provided direct electrophysiological evidence by single-unit recording and electrophysiological mapping that the elongated excitatory RF of a visual cell in the pigeon nucleus isthmi is constructed from aligned circular excitatory RFs of tectal cells, whereas its inhibitory RF originates from intranuclear inhibitory circuits. The orientation selectivity of an isthmic cell is mainly determined by its excitatory RF and sharply tuned by its inhibitory RF. Retrograde tracing showed that the tectal cells converging onto an isthmic cell are arranged in a narrow dorsoventral column in the tectum. According to the retinotopic map on the tectum, the excitatory RFs of these tectal cells are aligned in a line orthogonal to the horizontal meridian of the visual field in agreement with the result obtained by electrophysiological mapping.

Keywords: feedforward convergence; nucleus isthmi; optic tectum; orientation selectivity; visual system.
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 J. Neurosci.Home page
Y. Yang, Y. Yang, and S.-R. Wang
Neuronal Circuitry and Discharge Patterns Controlling Eye Movements in the Pigeon
J. Neurosci., October 15, 2008; 28(42): 10772 - 10780.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 J. Neurosci.Home page
G. Marin, C. Salas, E. Sentis, X. Rojas, J. C. Letelier, and J. Mpodozis
A Cholinergic Gating Mechanism Controlled by Competitive Interactions in the Optic Tectum of the Pigeon
J. Neurosci., July 25, 2007; 27(30): 8112 - 8121.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]


Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.