Colliculopulvinar contributions to alpha dysregulation and cognitive dysfunction in schizophrenia

精神分裂症(Sz)是一种与核心神经认知相关的严重精神障碍 赤字。尽管如此，传统的精神分裂症模型侧重于认知和认知功能障碍。 感觉处理皮质区域，越来越多的证据已经积累了暗示 皮质下加工障碍也是如此。大脑皮质下视觉通路的缺陷， 尤其是与大细胞视觉通路有关的基因，都与 早期皮质反应的产生，这反过来又有助于更高阶的皮质 减损。然而，这些缺陷可能并不能解释所有的视觉信息处理 Sz的异常。最近，我们观察到正在进行的头皮的调制存在缺陷- 记录的阿尔法活动，它似乎独立于传统的大脑皮层/小细胞 通路，这可能是由“视网膜顶盖”视觉通路的功能障碍所介导的。 累及丘脑上丘(SC)和丘脑枕核(PUN)，但 绕过外侧膝状核(LGN)。目前，用于评估的工具 神经精神科人群中的视网膜顶盖系统仍然有限。在这个项目中，我们将 对从基础科学中收集到的潜在范式进行并列比较 并将研究它们的可行性和心理测量学特性。 然后，这些范例将被用来评估Sz Relative中双关/SC加工的完整性 阿尔法生成和认知表现。

Schizophrenia (Sz) is a severe psychiatric disorder associated with core neurocognitive deficits. Although, traditional models of schizophrenia focus on dysfunction within cognitive and sensory processing cortical regions, increasing evidence has accumulated suggestive of subcortical processing impairments as well. Deficits along the subcortical visual pathways, especially involving the magnocellular visual pathway, have been tied to deficits in the generation of early cortical responses which, in turn, contribute to higher-order cortical impairments. These deficits, however, may not account for all visual information processing abnormalities in Sz. Recently, we have observed deficits in the modulation of ongoing scalp- recorded alpha activity, which appear independent of the traditional magno/parvocellular pathways, and which may be mediated by dysfunction of the “retinotectal” visual pathway, which involves the superior colliculus (SC) and the pulvinar nucleus of the thalamus (PuN), but which bypasses the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN). At present, tools for the evaluation of the retinotectal system within neuropsychiatric populations remain limited. In this project we will conduct a side-by-side comparison of potential paradigms gleaned from the basic science literature to elicit PuN/SC activation and will study their feasibility and psychometric properties. These paradigms will then be used to assess the integrity of PuN/SC processing in Sz relative to alpha generation and cognitive performance.