Crowe David A, Averbeck Bruno B, Chafee Matthew V, Georgopoulos Apostolos P
Brain Sciences Center, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, One Veterans Drive, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55417, USA.
Neuron. 2005 Sep 15;47(6):885-91. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2005.08.005.
Dynamic neural processing unrelated to changes in sensory input or motor output is likely to be a hallmark of cognitive operations. Here we show that neural representations of space in parietal cortex are dynamic while monkeys perform a spatial cognitive operation on a static visual stimulus. We recorded neural activity in area 7a during a visual maze task in which monkeys mentally followed a path without moving their eyes. We found that the direction of the followed path could be recovered from neuronal population activity. When the monkeys covertly processed a path that turned, the population representation of path direction shifted in the direction of the turn. This neural population dynamic took place during a period of unchanging visual input and showed characteristics of both serial and parallel processing. The data suggest that the dynamic evolution of parietal neuronal activity is associated with the progression of spatial cognitive operations.
与感觉输入或运动输出变化无关的动态神经处理可能是认知操作的一个标志。在这里，我们表明，当猴子对静态视觉刺激执行空间认知操作时，顶叶皮层中空间的神经表征是动态的。我们在一个视觉迷宫任务中记录了7a区的神经活动，在这个任务中，猴子在不移动眼睛的情况下在脑海中沿着一条路径行进。我们发现，所跟随路径的方向可以从神经元群体活动中恢复。当猴子暗中处理一条转弯的路径时，路径方向的群体表征会朝着转弯的方向移动。这种神经群体动态发生在视觉输入不变的时间段内，并表现出串行和平行处理的特征。数据表明，顶叶神经元活动的动态演变与空间认知操作的进展有关。
