Lab. voor Neuro- & Psychofysiologie, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
Leuven Brain Institute, Leuven, Belgium.
J Neurosci. 2018 Dec 12;38(50):10619-10630. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1539-18.2018. Epub 2018 Oct 24.
Nonhuman primates have proven to be a valuable animal model for exploring neuronal mechanisms of cognitive control. One important aspect of executive control is the ability to switch from one task to another, and task-switching paradigms have often been used in human volunteers to uncover the underlying neuronal processes. To date, however, no study has investigated task-switching paradigms in nonhuman primates during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We trained two rhesus macaques to switch between arm movement, eye movement, and passive fixation tasks during fMRI. Similar to results obtained in human volunteers, task switching elicits increased fMRI activations in prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, orbitofrontal cortex, and caudate nucleus. Our results indicate that the macaque monkey is a reliable model with which to investigate higher-order cognitive functioning such as task switching. As such, these results can pave the way for a detailed investigation of the neural basis of complex human behavior. Task switching is an important aspect of cognitive control, and task-switching paradigms have often been used to investigate higher-order executive functioning in human volunteers. We used a task-switching paradigm in the nonhuman primate during fMRI and found increased activation mainly in prefrontal areas (46, 45, frontal eye field, and anterior cingulate), in orbitofrontal area 12, and in the caudate nucleus. These data fit surprisingly well with previous human imaging data, proving that the monkey is an excellent model to study task switching with high spatiotemporal resolution tools that are currently not applicable in humans. As such, our results pave the way for a detailed interrogation of regions performing similar executive functions in humans and monkeys.
非人类灵长类动物已被证明是研究认知控制神经机制的有价值的动物模型。执行控制的一个重要方面是从一项任务切换到另一项任务的能力，任务切换范式经常被用于人类志愿者，以揭示潜在的神经过程。然而，迄今为止，还没有研究在功能磁共振成像 (fMRI) 中研究非人类灵长类动物的任务切换范式。我们训练了两只恒河猴在 fMRI 期间在手臂运动、眼动和被动固定任务之间进行切换。与在人类志愿者中获得的结果相似，任务切换会引起前额叶皮层、前扣带皮层、眶额皮层和尾状核的 fMRI 激活增加。我们的结果表明，猕猴是一种可靠的模型，可以用来研究高级认知功能，如任务切换。因此，这些结果可以为复杂人类行为的神经基础的详细研究铺平道路。任务切换是认知控制的一个重要方面，任务切换范式经常被用于研究人类志愿者的高级执行功能。我们在 fMRI 期间的非人类灵长类动物中使用了任务切换范式，发现主要在前额区域（46、45、额眼区和前扣带皮层）、眶额区域 12 和尾状核中激活增加。这些数据与之前的人类成像数据惊人地吻合，证明猴子是研究任务切换的极好模型，使用目前在人类中不可用的高时空分辨率工具。因此，我们的结果为详细研究人类和猴子执行类似执行功能的区域铺平了道路。
