Psychology Department, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115-2892, USA.
Eur J Neurosci. 2011 Jan;33(2):371-81. doi: 10.1111/j.1460-9568.2010.07504.x. Epub 2010 Dec 7.
Debate surrounds the role of the limbic system structures' contribution to spatial orientation. The results from previous studies have supported a role for the mammillary bodies and their projections to the anterior thalamus in rapid encoding of relationships among environmental cues; however, this work is based on behavioral tasks in which environmental and self-movement cues could not be dissociated. The present study examines the effects of mammillothalamic tract lesions on spatial orientation in the food hoarding paradigm and the water maze. Although the food hoarding paradigm dissociates the use of environmental and self-movement cues, both sources of information are available to guide performance in the water maze. Mammillothalamic tract lesions selectively impaired performance on both tasks. These impairments are interpreted as providing further evidence for the role of limbic system structures in processing self-movement cues.
围绕边缘系统结构对空间定位的作用存在争议。先前的研究结果支持了乳头体及其向丘脑前核的投射在快速编码环境线索之间关系中的作用；然而，这项工作是基于行为任务，其中环境和自身运动线索不能被分离。本研究在食物贮藏范式和水迷宫中检查了乳头丘脑束损伤对空间定位的影响。尽管食物贮藏范式分离了环境和自身运动线索的使用，但这两种信息来源都可用于指导水迷宫中的表现。乳头丘脑束损伤选择性地损害了这两个任务的表现。这些损伤被解释为提供了进一步的证据，证明边缘系统结构在处理自身运动线索方面的作用。
