Graziano M S, Reiss L A, Gross C G
Department of Psychology, Princeton University, New Jersey 08544, USA.
Nature. 1999 Feb 4;397(6718):428-30. doi: 10.1038/17115.
Humans can accurately perceive the location of a sound source-not only the direction, but also the distance. Sounds near the head, within ducking or reaching distance, have a special saliency. However, little is known about this perception of auditory distance. The direction to a sound source can be determined by interaural differences, and the mechanisms of direction perception have been studied intensively; but except for studies on echolocation in the bat, little is known about how neurons encode information on auditory distance. Here we describe neurons in the brain of macaque monkeys (Macaca fascicularis) that represent the auditory space surrounding the head, within roughly 30 cm. These neurons, which are located in the ventral premotor cortex, have spatial receptive fields that extend a limited distance outward from the head.
人类能够准确感知声源的位置——不仅是方向，还有距离。头部附近、在躲避或够及范围内的声音具有特殊的显著性。然而，对于这种听觉距离的感知却知之甚少。声源的方向可以通过双耳差异来确定，并且方向感知的机制已经得到了深入研究；但除了对蝙蝠回声定位的研究外，关于神经元如何编码听觉距离信息却所知甚少。在这里，我们描述了猕猴（食蟹猴）大脑中代表头部周围大致30厘米范围内听觉空间的神经元。这些神经元位于腹侧运动前皮层，其空间感受野从头部向外延伸有限的距离。
