Zaretskaya Natalia
Institute of Psychology, University of Graz, Universitaetsplatz 2, Graz, 8010, Austria; BioTechMed-Graz, Mozartgasse 12/II, Graz, 8010, Austria.
Prog Neurobiol. 2021 Dec;207:101998. doi: 10.1016/j.pneurobio.2021.101998. Epub 2021 Jan 23.
One of the central questions in visual neuroscience is how the sparse retinal signals leaving our eyes are transformed into a rich subjective visual experience of the world. Invasive physiology studies, which offers the highest spatial resolution, have revealed many facts about the processing of simple visual features like contrast, color, and orientation, focusing on the early visual areas. At the same time, standard human fMRI studies with comparably coarser spatial resolution have revealed more complex, functionally specialized, and category-selective responses in higher visual areas. Although the visual system is the best understood among the sensory modalities, these two areas of research remain largely segregated. High-resolution fMRI opens up a possibility for linking them. On the one hand, it allows studying how the higher-level visual functions affect the fine-scale activity in early visual areas. On the other hand, it allows discovering the fine-scale functional organization of higher visual areas and exploring their functional connectivity with visual areas lower in the hierarchy. In this review, I will discuss examples of successful work undertaken in these directions using high-resolution fMRI and discuss where this method could be applied in the future to advance our understanding of the complexity of higher-level visual processing.
视觉神经科学的核心问题之一是，离开我们眼睛的稀疏视网膜信号是如何转化为对世界丰富的主观视觉体验的。侵入性生理学研究具有最高的空间分辨率，它揭示了许多关于对比度、颜色和方向等简单视觉特征处理的事实，主要聚焦于早期视觉区域。与此同时，具有相对较低空间分辨率的标准人类功能磁共振成像（fMRI）研究揭示了更高视觉区域中更复杂、功能特化和类别选择性的反应。尽管视觉系统是感觉模态中最被了解的，但这两个研究领域在很大程度上仍然是分开的。高分辨率fMRI为连接它们提供了一种可能。一方面，它可以研究高级视觉功能如何影响早期视觉区域的精细尺度活动。另一方面，它可以发现更高视觉区域的精细尺度功能组织，并探索它们与层次结构中较低视觉区域的功能连接。在这篇综述中，我将讨论使用高分辨率fMRI在这些方向上开展的成功工作的例子，并讨论该方法未来可应用于哪些方面，以推进我们对高级视觉处理复杂性的理解。
