Visual perception during movements of the eyes and head

视觉感知是意识体验中不可或缺的一部分，因此，人类大脑的近一半用于处理视觉图像也就不足为奇了。对于准确的视觉感知，同样重要的是移动眼睛、头部和身体的能力。这样的动作让我们能够彻底探索周围的环境，但它们也会在进入的视觉图像中引入突然的变化。然而，我们对视觉世界的感知是相当稳定的，这表明大脑的视觉处理中心包含补偿这种干扰的机制。了解大脑是如何完成这一壮举的，是神经科学中最重要的问题之一，因为它关系到一个更普遍的问题，即大脑如何利用自己的运动指令反馈来实现准确而稳定的感觉处理。事实上，反馈电机控制的问题在从机器人到人机界面设计的许多领域都引起了普遍的兴趣。 在NSERC的上一次拨款期间，我的实验室与蒙特利尔神经研究所的合作者一起，积极参与了解大脑如何在眼球运动中解释视觉信号。我们发现了一种通用计算的证据，该计算考虑了眼睛运动的空间和时间特性，并增强了某些类型的视觉信号以进行补偿。在即将到来的拨款期间，我们将扩大我们的研究范围，将头部运动时的视觉感知包括在内。我们的目标是通过行为测试和单神经元记录，分离出在自然主义环境下眼睛和头部运动时有助于稳定视觉感知的大脑机制。

Visual perception is an integral part of conscious experience, and so it is not surprising that nearly half the human brain is devoted to the processing of visual images. Equally important for accurate visual perception is the ability to move the eyes, head, and body. Such movements allow us to explore our surroundings thoroughly, but they also introduce abrupt changes in the incoming visual images. Nevertheless, our perception of the visual world is quite stable, indicating that the visual processing centres of the brain contain mechanisms that compensate for such disturbances. Understanding how the brain accomplishes this feat is one of the most important questions in neuroscience, as it bears on the more general question of how the brain uses feedback from its own motor commands to achieve accurate and stable sensory processing. Indeed the issue of feedback motor control is of general interest in a number of domains, ranging from robotics to the design of human-machine interfaces. During the last NSERC grant period, my laboratory, along with collaborators at the Montreal Neurological Institute, has been actively involved in understanding how the brain interprets visual signals during eye movements. We have found evidence for a general computation that takes into account the spatial and temporal properties of the eye movement and enhances certain kinds of visual signals to compensate. In the upcoming grant period we will extend our research to include visual perception during head movements. Our goal is to isolate, through behavioral testing and single-neuron recording, the brain mechanisms that contribute to stable visual perception during eye and head movements in naturalistic settings.