Cortical substrates of tactile and multisensory processing

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My research program has two central thrusts: to characterize the spatial organization and processing features of human somatosensory cortex and to understand how such somatosensory information is combined with other sensory information to solve multisensory tasks involving motion and pattern perception.   Over the past five years I have been using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to functionally localize cortical regions in the human brain that process somatosensory information. For example, I have examined the representation of particular body parts (face and fingers) in human somatosensory cortex (i.e., somatosensory somatotopy) using a pneumatic stimulation technique that I developed for use in the fMRI environment.  I have also conducted studies examining the neural substrates of haptic object and face perception. I will pursue two general themes in the proposed research.   First, I want to continue investigating the functional characteristics of somatosensory cortex and related cortical regions by investigating how temporal aspects of tactile stimulation modulate activity in these regions.  Second, I would like to explore how different sensory signals (visual and tactile) interact to achieve particular behavioural goals. I will use psychophysical techniques to explore these questions with the aim of importing such techniques into a neuroimaging context. The work outlined in this grant will contribute not only to our understanding of the nature of the signals arising within human parietal and associated cortex during tactile stimulation, but it will also provide information about how tactile signals are combined with other sensory signals to solve multisensory tasks.