Influence of Head and Eye Movements on Visual Input Statistics and Early Neural Representations

头部和眼睛运动对视觉输入统计和早期神经表征的影响

• 批准号: 1127216
• 负责人: Michele Rucci
• 金额: $ 45.6万
• 依托单位: Trustees of Boston University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2011-09-01 至 2015-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1127216&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Influence; Head; Eye; Movements; Visual

We are normally not aware that our eyes and head are always in motion. Yet small, involuntary head and eye movements continually occur, even when we attempt to keep our gaze fixed on a point in the scene. It has long been known that the temporal modulations resulting from these movements are essential for seeing: the world becomes progressively fainter and will eventually fade altogether when the head and eyes are immobilized. However, the specific mechanisms by which fixational movements contribute to vision remain unknown. With funding from the National Science Foundation, Dr. Rucci and his team at Boston University will measure microscopic head and eye movements in human observers and reconstruct the input signals entering their eyes. The investigators will then use these data to quantify the impact of the observer's actions on the sensory flow of information and examine how this flow changes during the execution of different visual activities.This research will investigate the mechanisms by which fixational movements contribute to the processing of visual information in the brain and the establishment of a stable visual percept. Elucidating the impact of fixational movements is critical to advancing our knowledge of how the visual system functions and how to build machines which replicate human visual capabilities. Furthermore, abnormal fixational eye movementsoccur in various pathological conditions. A thorough understanding of the functions of fixational eye movements may lead to treatment of the visual impairments associated with such conditions.

我们通常不会意识到我们的眼睛和头总是在运动。然而，即使我们试图将目光固定在场景中的一点上，头部和眼睛也会不断地发生微小的、无意识的运动。人们早就知道，由这些运动引起的时间调制对视觉至关重要：当头部和眼睛固定不动时，世界会逐渐变得模糊，最终会完全消失。然而，固视运动促进视觉的具体机制仍然未知。在美国国家科学基金会的资助下，鲁奇博士和他在波士顿大学的团队将测量人类观察者的微观头部和眼睛运动，并重建进入他们眼睛的输入信号。研究人员将利用这些数据来量化观察者的动作对感觉信息流的影响，并研究这种信息流在执行不同视觉活动时的变化。本研究将探讨注视运动有助于大脑处理视觉信息和建立稳定的视觉感知的机制。阐明注视运动的影响对于推进我们对视觉系统如何运作以及如何构建复制人类视觉能力的机器的知识至关重要。此外，异常注视眼球运动发生在各种病理条件下。彻底了解注视性眼球运动的功能可能会导致治疗与这些条件相关的视觉障碍。