Development of Category-Selective Domains in Inferotemporal Cortex

描述（由申请人提供）：本研究的目的是研究幼猴颞下皮层类别选择区域的正常发育。在成年人类和猴子中，颞叶的离散区域专门用于处理特定的对象类别，如面孔、文字、身体或地点。目前尚不清楚这种专门化是天生的，还是由于广泛的早期经验而产生的，也不知道拥有这种专门化领域的功能意义是什么。为了找出这些特征域是天生的还是随着时间的推移而发展的，研究人员将对小猴子进行扫描，从出生开始，然后在发育过程中反复使用功能性核磁共振成像。我们的实验室已经开发出一种技术来扫描警觉的幼猴，这种技术完全是非侵入性的，对猴子没有伤害。了解像面部识别这样重要的东西在多大程度上是天生的，以及回路的哪些方面需要经验才能发展，这将是至关重要的。此外，通过定义颞下皮层类别特异性区域功能分离的正常发育阶段，我们将看到特定物体识别技能的习得是否与特定的认知能力相关

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The goal of the proposed research is to study the normal development of category selective domains in inferotemporal cortex in infant macaques. In adult humans and monkeys, discrete regions of the temporal lobe are specialized for processing particular object categories, such as faces, text, bodies, or places. It is unknown whether this specialization is innate or arises as a consequence of extensive early experience, and it is not known what the functional significance is of having such specialized domains. To find out whether these characteristic domains are innate or develop over time, infant monkeys will be scanned, starting at birth, then repeatedly during development, using functional MRI. Our laboratory has developed techniques for scanning alert infant monkeys that are entirely non-invasive, and not harmful to the monkeys. It will be of fundamental importance to know to what degree something as important as face recognition is innate and what aspects of the circuitry require experience for their development. Furthermore by defining the normal developmental stages of the functional segregation of category-specific domains in inferotemporal cortex, we will see whether the acquisition of particular object recognition skills correlates with particular anatomical developmental stages, possibly illuminating the functional consequences of having specialized domains. In addition, we will examine the relationship between category-selectivity and retinotopy. Our working hypothesis is that a retinotopic organization in IT precedes category-selectivity and biases the processing of particular objects (e.g. faces in foveal representations of IT and places in peripheral representations of IT). We propose that this initial retinotopic proto-organization eventually gives way to a spatially invariant, non-retinotopic category- selective organization.