NEURAL MECHANISMS CONTROLLING RECEPTIVE FIELD PARAMETERS

我的项目的长期目标是确定交互连接在皮质动力学和“感官知觉”中的作用。在这里，我将调查他们的感受野参数和功能架构的初级视觉皮层的效果。尽管事实上大多数皮质区域都具有与相应的上行连接相当或在某些情况下比其更大的下行或水平连接，但这些相互连接对视觉信息处理的贡献几乎完全未知。在我作为NRSA博士预科生的时候，我表明，从纹状体外区，18区（V2）连接的可逆低温失活，改变了猫初级视觉皮层（17区（V1））的选择性和功能结构（Sailstad et.例如，1999年）。然而，由于冷却使几乎所有皮层失活，因此很难分离和识别区域18通过其产生区域17的选择性和功能结构变化的神经元回路。因此，为了正确解释该冷却数据，我打算使用GABA注射而不是冷却板来冷却猫区域18中特定层的一个小区域。当18区失活时，我将通过同时记录17区的内在光信号和多单位细胞外信号来观察其对选择性和功能的影响。为了确定这些连接在多大程度上有助于动态感受野特性，并允许一个有效的解释我的结果关于相互连接的作用，我将重新计算区域18和计算其对动态方向调整与Ringach等使用的反向相关方法的影响。1997年。

The long-term goal of my project is to determine the role of reciprocal connections in cortical dynamics and "sensory perception". Here I shall investigate their effect on receptive field parameters and functional architecture of the primary visual cortex. Despite the fact that most cortical areas have descending or horizontal connections that are comparable to, or in some cases more massive than their corresponding ascending connections, the contribution of these reciprocal connections to the processing of visual information is almost completely unknown. During my time as a NRSA predoctorate recipient, I showed that reversible cryogenic inactivation of connections from the extrastriate region, area 18 (V2), alters both selectivity and functional structure of cat primary visual cortex (area 17 (V1)) (Sailstad et. al., 1999). However because cooling inactivated almost all the cortical layers, it is difficult to isolate and identify the neuronal circuitry through which area 18 produces changes in selectivity and functional architecture of area 17. Therefore to properly interpret this cooling data, I intend to use GABA injections instead of a cooling plate to inactivate a small region of a particular layer in cat area 18. While area 18 is inactivated, I will observe its effect on selectivity and function by simultaneously recording both the intrinsic optical signal and multi-unit extracellular signal from area 17. To determine the extent to which these connections contribute to dynamic receptive field properties, and to allow a valid interpretation of my results with regard to the role of reciprocal connections, I will inactivate area 18 and calculate its effect on dynamic orientation tuning with the reverse correlation method used by Ringach et. al. 1997.