Neurons selective to the number of visual items in the corvid songbird endbrain
Neurons selective to the number of visual items in the corvid songbird endbrain
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DOI：
10.1073/pnas.1504245112
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发表时间：
2015-06-23
影响因子：
11.1
通讯作者：
Nieder, Andreas
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Ditz, Helen M.;Nieder, Andreas
目前尚不清楚不同脊椎动物端脑的解剖学特化是否决定了代表数值的神经元代码。因此，我们记录了经过训练来判断展示物品数量的乌鸦端脑的单神经元活动。无论物品的物理外观如何，许多神经元都会针对数字进行调整，并且它们的活动与表现结果相关。对数字的行为和神经元表示的比较表明，正如韦伯-费希纳定律所假设的那样，数据最好通过数字信息的对数压缩缩放来描述。乌鸦的行为和神经元数量表征出人意料地很好地反映了灵长类关联皮层中发现的情况。这一发现表明，具有独立发育的端脑的远缘脊椎动物采用相似的神经元解决方案来处理数量。
It is unknown whether anatomical specializations in the endbrains of different vertebrates determine the neuronal code to represent numerical quantity. Therefore, we recorded single-neuron activity from the endbrain of crows trained to judge the number of items in displays. Many neurons were tuned for numerosities irrespective of the physical appearance of the items, and their activity correlated with performance outcome. Comparison of both behavioral and neuronal representations of numerosity revealed that the data are best described by a logarithmically compressed scaling of numerical information, as postulated by the Weber-Fechner law. The behavioral and neuronal numerosity representations in the crow reflect surprisingly well those found in the primate association cortex. This finding suggests that distantly related vertebrates with independently developed endbrains adopted similar neuronal solutions to process quantity.