Characterization of Multiple Factors in Training and Plasticity in Central Vision Loss

训练中多因素的表征和中央视力丧失的可塑性

• 批准号: 10359782
• 负责人: Aaron R Seitz
• 金额: $ 57.36万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT BIRMINGHAM
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-03-01 至 2025-02-28
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10359782
• 关键词: Address; Adult; Affect; Attention; Behavior; Behavioral; Biological Models; Blindness; Brain; Central Scotomas; Complex; Data Set; Eye; Eye Movements; Face; Financial compensation; Individual; Individual Differences; Investigation; Knowledge; Learning; Literature; Macular degeneration; Measures; Methods; Mission; Modeling; Modification; National Institute of Mental Health; Neuronal Plasticity; Outcome; Patients; Pattern; Perceptual learning; Performance; Peripheral; Persons; Photoreceptors; Population; Process; Psychophysics; Public Health; Reading; Recovery; Rehabilitation therapy; Research; Research Design; Research Project Summaries; Research Support; Rest; Sampling; Scotoma; Sensory; Structure; System; Testing; Training; Translating; Vision; Vision Disorders; Visual; Visual Cortex; Visual impairment; Work; aging population; behavior change; behavioral outcome; behavioral plasticity; cognitive control; cohesion; experience; extrastriate visual cortex; gaze; improved; innovation; learning outcome; lens; macula; novel strategies; novel therapeutics; preservation; relating to nervous system; spatial integration; visual process; visual processing

Project Summary Research on perceptual learning (PL) has been dominated by studies that seek to isolate and improve individual visual processes. However, an important translational outcome of PL research is to address the needs of patients with vision loss, who seek to improve performance on daily tasks such as reading, navigation, and face recognition. These more ecological cases of behavioral change and cortical plasticity, which are inherently complex and integrative, have revealed significant gaps in a more holistic understanding of how multiple visual processes and their associated brain systems jointly contribute to durable and generalizable PL. To address these gaps, here we study simulated and natural central vision loss. We focus on macular degeneration (MD), one of the most common causes of vision loss (projected to affect 248 million people worldwide by 2040), which results from damage to photoreceptors in the macula that disrupts central vision. Such central vision loss is a superb lens through which study to how ecologically relevant changes in the use of vision relate to changing brain activity and connectivity because it represents a massive alteration in visual experience requiring reliance on peripheral vision for daily tasks. With the use of eye-trackers and gaze-contingent displays that induce central scotomas, central vision loss can be simulated in normally seeing individuals, who then develop peripheral looking patterns that resemble compensatory vision strategies seen in MD patients. Ideal use of peripheral vision requires improvement in multiple vision domains, three of the most important being: early visual processing (e.g., visual sensitivity), mid-level visual processing (e.g., spatial integration), and attention and eye-movements. To date, no study has systematically investigated these three domains of PL and their neural underpinnings. The proposed research plan rests on rigorous prior work showing that PL influences multiple brain structures and functions related to these three domains. We propose a novel approach of systematically measuring how different training regimes related to the three domains influence a broad range of psychophysical and ecological behaviors (Aim 1), how these changes arise from plasticity in brain structure and function (Aim 2), and how PL after simulated central vision loss compares to PL in MD (Aim 3). This work is significant and innovative as it will be the first integrated study of PL characterizing multiple trainable factors and their impact on diverse behavioral outcomes and on cutting-edge assessments of neural representations and dynamics. It is also the first study to directly compare PL in MD patients with PL in a controlled model system of central visual field loss with simulated scotomas, which if validated will allow the use of this model system to interrogate MD in larger samples of healthy individuals. We will also share a unique dataset that will help the field to understand behavioral and neural plasticity after central vision loss and individual differences in responsiveness to training. Finally, this work will illuminate basic mechanisms of brain plasticity after sensory loss that may generalize to other forms of rehabilitation after peripheral or central damage.

项目概要 知觉学习（PL）的研究一直以寻求孤立和改善个体的研究为主。 视觉过程。然而，PL 研究的一个重要转化成果是满足患者的需求 患有视力丧失，寻求提高阅读、导航和面部识别等日常任务表现的人 认出。这些行为改变和皮质可塑性的生态案例本质上是 复杂且综合，揭示了在更全面地理解多重视觉如何 过程及其相关的大脑系统共同有助于持久且可推广的 PL。致地址 这些差距，在这里我们研究模拟和自然的中央视力丧失。我们专注于黄斑变性（MD）， 视力丧失的最常见原因之一（预计到 2040 年将影响全球 2.48 亿人）， 黄斑部感光细胞受损导致中央视力受损。这种中心视力丧失是 出色的镜头，通过它研究视觉使用中的生态相关变化如何与变化相关 大脑活动和连接性，因为它代表了需要依赖的视觉体验的巨大改变 关于日常任务的余光。通过使用眼动仪和注视相关显示器来诱导中枢 可以在正常视力的个体中模拟盲点、中央视力丧失，然后这些人会出现周边视力丧失 观察模式类似于 MD 患者的代偿性视力策略。余光的理想运用 需要在多个视觉领域进行改进，其中最重要的三个是：早期视觉处理（例如， 视觉敏感性）、中级视觉处理（例如空间整合）以及注意力和眼球运动。到 迄今为止，还没有研究系统地研究 PL 的这三个领域及其神经基础。这 拟议的研究计划基于严格的先前工作，表明 PL 影响多个大脑结构和 与这三个领域相关的功能。我们提出了一种系统地测量如何 与这三个领域相关的不同训练制度会影响广泛的心理物理和生态 行为（目标 1），这些变化如何由大脑结构和功能的可塑性引起（目标 2），以及 PL 如何 模拟中心视力丧失后与 MD 中的 PL 进行比较（目标 3）。这项工作意义重大且具有创新性 是第一个关于 PL 的综合研究，描述了多个可训练因素及其对不同行为的影响 结果以及神经表征和动力学的前沿评估。这也是第一个研究 直接比较 MD 患者的 PL 与中央视野丧失受控模型系统中的 PL 和模拟 暗点，如果经过验证，将允许使用该模型系统在更大的健康样本中询问 MD 个人。我们还将分享一个独特的数据集，帮助该领域了解行为和神经 中心视力丧失后的可塑性和对训练反应的个体差异。最后，这项工作将 阐明感觉丧失后大脑可塑性的基本机制，这可能会推广到其他形式的 周围或中枢损伤后的康复。