Comparison of visually evoked local field potentials in isolated turtle brain: patterned versus blank stimulation.

Isolated turtle brain/eye preparation has recently been used as a bloodless animal model for detecting the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) signal changes produced by visually evoked neuronal currents. The present work aims to determine whether checkerboard-patterned or full field flash (blank) stimulation should be used in order to achieve stronger neuronal responses in turtle brain/eye preparation. The knowledge gained in this study is essential for optimizing the visual stimulation methods in functional neuroimaging studies using turtle brain/eye preparation. In this study, visually evoked local field potentials (LFPs) were measured and compared in turtle visual cortex and optic tectum elicited by checkerboard and full field flash stimuli with three different inter-stimulus intervals (ISIs=5, 10, and 16s). It was found that the behavior of neuronal adaptation in the cortical and tectal LFP signals for checkerboard stimulation was comparable to flash stimulation. In addition, there was no significant difference in the LFP peak amplitudes (ISI=16s) between these two stimuli. These results indicate that the intensity of neuronal responses to checkerboard is comparable to flash stimulation. These two stimulation methods should be equivalent in functional neuroimaging studies using turtle brain/eye preparation.