CAS Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, Institute of Neuroscience, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 200031, Shanghai, China.
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100049, Beijing, China.
Nat Commun. 2022 Sep 19;13(1):5479. doi: 10.1038/s41467-022-33245-5.
Optic flow is a powerful cue for inferring self-motion status which is critical for postural control, spatial orientation, locomotion and navigation. In primates, neurons in extrastriate visual cortex (MSTd) are predominantly modulated by high-order optic flow patterns (e.g., spiral), yet a functional link to direct perception is lacking. Here, we applied electrical microstimulation to selectively manipulate population of MSTd neurons while macaques discriminated direction of rotation around line-of-sight (roll) or direction of linear-translation (heading), two tasks which were orthogonal in 3D spiral coordinate using a four-alternative-forced-choice paradigm. Microstimulation frequently biased animal's roll perception towards coded labeled-lines of the artificial-stimulated neurons in either context with spiral or pure-rotation stimuli. Choice frequency was also altered between roll and translation flow-pattern. Our results provide direct causal-link evidence supporting that roll signals in MSTd, despite often mixed with translation signals, can be extracted by downstream areas for perception of rotation relative to gravity-vertical.
光流是推断自身运动状态的有力线索，对于姿势控制、空间定位、运动和导航至关重要。在灵长类动物中，外侧视觉皮层（MSTd）中的神经元主要受到高阶光流模式（例如螺旋）的调制，但缺乏与直接感知的功能联系。在这里，我们应用电微刺激选择性地操纵 MSTd 神经元群体，而猕猴则在视线（滚动）或线性平移（航向）方向上区分旋转方向，这两个任务在三维螺旋坐标系中是正交的，使用了四选一强制选择范式。微刺激经常使动物的滚动感知偏向于在螺旋或纯旋转刺激的情况下人工刺激神经元的编码标记线。在滚动和平移流模式之间，选择频率也发生了变化。我们的结果提供了直接的因果联系证据，支持 MSTd 中的滚动信号，尽管经常与平移信号混合，但可以通过下游区域提取出来，用于感知相对于重力垂直的旋转。
