Vestibular and Neck Contribution to Oculomotor Processing in the Frontal Cortex

前庭和颈部对额叶皮层动眼神经处理的贡献

• 批准号: 7777609
• 负责人: Lewis L Chen
• 金额: $ 7.55万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS MED BR GALVESTON
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2006
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2006-09-30 至 2009-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/7777609
• 关键词: Animals; Chronic; Classification; Data; Detection; Dissociation; Eye; Force of Gravity; Head; Labyrinth; Metric; Monkeys; Motor; Movement; Neck; Neurons; Organ; Positioning Attribute; Process; Proprioception; Research; Saccades; Shapes; Signal Transduction; Techniques; Testing; Update; Vestibule; Visual; Visual Fields; Work; base; body position; frontal eye fields; frontal lobe; innovation; insight; motor control; neuromechanism; novel strategies; oculomotor; otoconia; preference; research study; vector; visual motor

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Vast amounts of research in the past have shown that the evoked oculomotor vectors reflect the process of visuomotor coordinate transformation. Some recent studies have shown that non-oculomotor variables, such as vestibule and/or neck proprioception, can alter the oculomotor coordinates. Our preliminary studies further indicate that the directions of the neurally evoked saccadic vectors in the frontal eye field (FEF) are shifted in the compensatory direction with respect to changes in static vertical head position. These findings together suggest that the vestibule and/or neck inputs may be critical in updating the visuomotor coordinate frames even if the head is not moving. Based on these findings, we hypothesize that the otoliths, the inner ear organs dedicated to the detection of static head position with respect to gravity, may provide critical inputs to the frontal cortex to help shape the oculomotor coordinates. Alternatively, the neck proprioceptive inputs, which often vary together with the vestibular signals, may be important. To determine whether our findings are contributed solely by vestibular inputs (vestibule hypothesis), neck proprioceptive inputs (neck hypothesis), or both, we have developed a novel approach which permits dissociation of vestibular and neck influences based on independent control of the pertinent movement variables, e.g. initial eye position (IEP), initial head position (IHP), and initial neck position (INP), in head-unrestrained animals. The predictions of the working hypotheses will be evaluated by systematic manipulation of these variables in the proposed experiments. Under Specific Aim 1, we will assess whether vestibular and/or neck proprioceptive inputs participate in the visuomotor coordinate processing (i.e. determining the directions of the stimulation-evoked saccades) in the FEF and supplementary eye field (SEF) of head-unrestrained monkeys. Under Specific Aim 2, we will determine if the vestibular and neck proprioceptive input updates the motor and/or visual coordinates of FEF and SEF neurons. These experiments are expected to bring insights into the understanding of cortical processing of spatial coordinates, and the findings will be important to further the understanding of the neural mechanisms of motor control in general.

描述（由申请人提供）：过去大量的研究表明，诱发的眼动向量反映了视觉坐标变换的过程。最近的一些研究表明，非动眼变量（例如前庭和/或颈部本体感觉）可以改变动眼坐标。我们的初步研究进一步表明，在额叶眼场（FEF）的神经诱发的扫视矢量的方向转移的补偿方向相对于静态垂直头部位置的变化。这些发现共同表明，前庭和/或颈部输入可能是至关重要的更新视觉坐标框架，即使头部不移动。基于这些发现，我们假设，耳石，内耳器官专用于静态头部位置相对于重力的检测，可能提供关键的输入到额叶皮层，以帮助形状的眼坐标。或者，颈部本体感受输入，这往往是随着前庭信号的变化，可能是重要的。为了确定我们的发现是否仅仅是由前庭输入贡献的（前庭假说），颈部本体感受输入（颈部假设）或两者，我们已经开发了一种新的方法，其允许基于相关运动变量的独立控制来分离前庭和颈部影响，例如初始眼睛位置（IEP）、初始头部位置（IHP）和初始颈部位置（INP），在头部不受约束的动物中。工作假设的预测将通过在拟议的实验中对这些变量进行系统操作来评估。在特定目标1下，我们将评估前庭和/或颈部本体感受输入是否参与头部不受约束的猴子的FEF和补充视野（SEF）中的视觉坐标处理（即确定刺激诱发的扫视的方向）。在特定目标2下，我们将确定前庭和颈部本体感受输入是否更新FEF和SEF神经元的运动和/或视觉坐标。这些实验有望为理解空间坐标的皮层处理带来新的见解，这些发现对于进一步理解运动控制的神经机制具有重要意义。