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Corticopontine projection in the rat: the distribution of labelled cortical cells after large injections of horseradish peroxidase in the pontine nuclei.

The distribution of cortical cells projecting to the pontine nuclei in rats was studied by making large injections of horseradish peroxidase that filled the basilar pons and measuring the density of labelled cells in each cortical area. All retrogradely labelled cells were layer V pyramidal cells. The highest densities of labelled cells were observed in the motor areas. The lowest densities were in temporal association cortex and perirhinal cortex. Visual cortical areas, including the primary visual cortex, provided a major source of pontine projections. The distribution of corticopontine cells within the primary visual cortex was studied in more detail. In all cases the highest density of labelled cells was observed in the region of cortex that represents the nasal visual field. Control injections into brainstem regions adjacent to the pontine nuclei produced a much lower absolute density of retrogradely labelled cortical cells and the distribution of those cells was different from that observed following pontine injections. We conclude that every area of the rat's cerebral cortex projects to the pontine nuclei and that there are consistent variations in the density of the projections both between and within areas.

Animals

Prosencephalic connections of striate and extrastriate areas of rat visual cortex.

Afferent connections of rat primary visual cortex (area 17 or V1 area) and the rostral and caudal parts of areas 18a and 18b were studied, by placing in each of the areas, small electrophoretic injections of enzyme horseradish peroxidase (HRP) or wheat germ agglutinated-HRP. The results indicate that: 1) each of the areas has a distinct pattern of distribution of afferent neurons in the ipsilateral visual thalamus - area 17 receives its principal thalamic input from the dorsal lateral geniculate nucleus, the caudal parts of areas 18a and 18b receive a major thalamic input from the lateral posterior nucleus and a minor input from the posterior nucleus, while the rostral parts of areas 18a and 18b receive a major input from the posterior nucleus, and a minor projection from the lateral posterior nucleus; 2) the rostral and caudal parts of areas 18a and 18b each receive an associational input from area 17; 3) the rostral parts of areas 18a and 18b each receive associational input from three different extrastriate regions, the caudal part of the same extrastriate area, and the rostral and caudal parts of the other extrastriate area, whereas the caudal parts of areas 18a and 18b receive associational inputs only from one or two extrastriate regions; 4) area 17, area 18b and rostral area 18a each receive a substantial associational input from lamina V of the caudal part of the frontal eye field (FEF) in the motor cortex; however the input from the FEF to caudal area 18a (if present) is very small; 5) The extrastriate areas studied receive associational input from the restrosplenial cingulate area 29d; however, the input from area 29d to area 17 appears to be very small. The distinct patterns of distribution of prosencephalic afferents suggest to us that multiple retinotopically organized areas described previously in the rat cortex (cf Montero 1981; Espinoza and Thomas 1983) represent functionally distinct areas.

Afferent Pathways

Neuropeptide Y-containing neurons are situated predominantly outside cytochrome oxidase puffs in macaque visual cortex.

Layers II/III of the primary visual cortex contain a regular pattern of histochemically detectable cytochrome oxidase (CO)-rich "puffs," which differ from the interpuff regions in their thalamo-cortical and cortico-cortical connectivity, receptive-field properties, and the density of inhibitory GABA-containing synaptic terminals. We used an immunocytochemical method, in combination with cytochrome oxidase histochemistry, to analyze the spatial relationship between neurons that contain neuropeptide Y (NPY) and the CO puffs. Of a total of 606 neurons, only 2.6% of the NPY-containing cells are located in the puffs, whereas the rest are situated in the interpuffs, or at the interface between puffs and interpuffs. The number of NPY-containing neurons in the puffs is substantially less than that expected in an equal volume of the interpuffs (X2 = 13.86; df = 1; P less than 0.001). These observations indicate that columns containing the puffs may differ also from those in the interpuff regions in that they contain a unique array of chemically and morphologically distinct local circuit neurons.

Animals

Interocular control of neuronal responsiveness in cat visual cortex.

Neurons in the cat primary visual cortex are selective for particular contour orientations but their responsiveness can vary under certain conditions. After prolonged stimulation (adaptation), the contrast sensitivity of cortical cells is reduced and the 'gain' (the strength of response as a function of contrast) falls. The response to an optimal contour is also reduced when a different stimulus is superimposed on the receptive field in the same eye. Here we report that the sudden appearance of an inappropriate stimulus in one eye can interocularly suppress the activity of cortical neurons if they are already responding to an optimally oriented stimulus in the other eye. In strabismic cats, whose cortical neurons lack binocular facilitation, even contours of similar orientation shown to the two eyes trigger such suppression. This interocular control of cortical responsiveness could serve to veto signals from one eye under conditions that would otherwise cause double vision and perceptual confusion.

Animals

Motion and shape perception in cerebral akinetopsia.

Motion cues serve many purposes in primate vision. Consequently, akinetopsia, a defect of movement perception due to cerebral lesions, would be expected to comprise a range of motion-related defects. To address this issue we explored further the perceptual profiles in akinetopsic subject L.M. who has motion perception deficits due to extensive bilateral lesions of the dorsolateral visual association cortex that spare primary visual cortex, area V1. We used several different experimental procedures. Using random-dot motion stimuli, we showed that L.M. can still perceive global coherent motion and discriminate motion direction, yet these abilities fail even at moderate levels of background noise. L.M. also viewed a two-frame apparent (phi) motion stimulus known as a Ternus display. Her performance on this test suggests defective 'long-range' apparent motion mechanisms. These results are clearly in agreement with previous reports. Additional experiments showed that L.M. can still perceive 2-D shape and 3-D structure-from-motion (SFM). However, like motion direction discrimination, these abilities broke down at moderate levels of moving and stationary noise. Surprisingly, L.M. also had trouble perceiving 2-D shapes defined by non-motion signals including 'on' and 'off' transients, dynamic and static binocular disparity, and static texture cues. Our findings highlight the role of the visual association cortex in extracting salient information from noise.

Adult

Receptive field expansion in adult visual cortex is linked to dynamic changes in strength of cortical connections.

1. Receptive field (RF) sizes of neurons in adult primary visual cortex are dynamic, expanding and contracting in response to alternate stimulation outside and within the RF over periods ranging from seconds to minutes. The substrate for this dynamic expansion was shown to lie in cortex, as opposed to subcortical parts of the visual pathway. The present study was designed to examine changes in cortical connection strengths that could underlie this observed plasticity by measuring the changes in cross-correlation histograms between pairs of primary visual cortex neurons that are induced to dynamically change their RF sizes. 2. Visually driven neural activity was recorded from single units in the superficial layers of primary visual cortex in adult cats, with two independent electrodes separated by 0.1-5 mm at their tips, and cross-correlated on-line. The neurons were then conditioned by stimulation with an "artificial scotoma," a field of flashing random dots filling the region of visual space around a blank rectangle enclosing the RFs of the recorded neurons. The neuronal RFs were tested for expansion and their visually driven output again cross-correlated. After this, the neurons were stimulated vigorously through their RF centers to induce the field to collapse, and the visually driven output from the collapsed RFs was again cross-correlated. Cross-correlograms obtained before and after conditioning, and after RF collapse, were normalized by their flanks to control for changes in peak size due solely to fluctuations in spike rate. 3. A total of 37 pairs of neurons that showed distinct cross-correlogram peaks, and whose RF borders were clearly discernible both before and after conditioning, were used in the final analysis. Of these neuron pairs, conditioning led to a clear expansion of RF boundaries in 28 pairs, whereas in 9 pairs the RFs did not expand. RFs that did expand showed no significant shifts in their orientation preference, orientation selectivity, or ocularity. 4. When the RFs of a pair of neurons expanded with conditioning, the area of the associated flank-normalized cross-correlogram peaks also increased (by a factor ranging from 0.84 up to 3.5). Correlograms returned to their preconditioning values when RFs collapsed.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)

Animals

Functional consequences of modification of callosal connections by perinatal enucleation in rat visual cortex.

The effects of neonatal monocular enucleation (right eye) on the callosal connections in the rat visual cortex were studied by physiological and morphological methods. Evoked activity was recorded in the left hemisphere, i.e. contralaterally to the enucleated eye. After enucleation, trans-callosally evoked responses were recorded in a widened stripe of the lateral visual cortex. Compared with the controls, the responsive area was expanded laterally and medially, i.e. into the lateral part of the primary visual area and within the secondary visual cortex (lateral part). Within about 0.5 mm of the expansion, the responses did not differ from those recorded in areas with "normal" callosal connections. Morphological evidence is presented suggesting that this expansion of evoked responses with high amplitudes and short latencies corresponds to an extension of callosal connections with a high density of axon terminals in layers two and three. Further medially within the primary visual cortex, callosally evoked responses with low amplitudes and longer latencies were recorded. The main types of unit responses and characteristic interactions between visually and callosally evoked responses are shown and discussed. These results suggest that following neonatal enucleation (1) the callosal connections expand and form functional synapses in the lateral part of the visual cortex, (2) these connections can activate cortical neurons either directly or by mediation of associational connections between the lateral secondary and primary visual cortex areas and (3) callosal connections can interact with visually evoked potentials and unit responses.

Animals

The role of ipsilateral and contralateral inputs from primary cortex in responses of area 21a neurons in cats.

Neuronal responses in cat visual area 21a were analyzed when the primary visual cortex (areas 17 and 18) was deactivated by cooling. Ipsilateral and contralateral cortices were deactivated separately. Results established that (1) cooling the ipsilateral primary cortex diminished the activity of all area 21a cells and, in 30%, blocked responsiveness altogether, and (2) cooling the contralateral primary cortex initially increased activity in area 21a cells but, with further cooling, reduced it to below the original level although only 9% of cells ceased responding. These findings were then compared to earlier results in which bilateral deactivation of the primary cortex greatly reduced and, in most cases, blocked the activity of area 21a cells (Michalski et al., 1993). Despite the response attenuation following cooling of the primary visual cortex (either ipsilateral or contralateral), neurons of area 21a retained their original orientation specificity and sharpness of tuning (measured as the half-width at half-height of the orientation tuning curve). Direction selectivity also tended to remain unchanged. We concluded that for area 21a cells (1) the ipsilateral primary cortex provides the main excitatory input; (2) the contralateral primary cortex supplies a large inhibitory input; and (3) the nature of orientation specificity, sharpness of orientation tuning, and direction selectivity are largely unaffected by removal of the ipsilateral hemisphere excitatory input or the contralateral hemisphere inhibitory input.

Animals

Localization of glutaminase-like and aspartate aminotransferase-like immunoreactivity in neurons of cerebral neocortex.

The distribution of glutaminase (GLNase)- and aspartate aminotransferase (AATase)-immunoreactive cells was examined in the cerebral neocortex of rat and guinea pig and in the somatic sensorimotor and primary visual cortex of the Macaca fascicularis monkey. These enzymes are involved in the metabolism of glutamate and aspartate, two amino acids thought to be excitatory amino acid transmitters for cortical neurons. In each of the species examined a large percentage of layer V and VI pyramidal neurons have pronounced glutaminase-like immunoreactivity (GLNase IR). In contrast, neurons in layers I, II, and IV show little GLNase IR. Layer III in the rat and guinea pig contains only a few, densely labeled GLNase-like-immunoreactive (GLNase-Ir) pyramidal neurons, whereas in the monkey the number of GLNase-Ir cells in layer III varies between cytoarchitectonic fields. Area 3b of the primary somatic sensory cortex and area 17 (primary visual cortex) contain few GLNase-Ir cells in layer III. However, layer III contains moderate numbers of GLNase IR in cells in areas 3a, 1, 2, 5, and in the primary motor cortex. Within the motor cortex the largest pyramidal ("Betz") cells are not labeled. In marked contrast to the results with antibody to GLNase, antibody to AATase labels cells that appear nonpyramidal in form, and these cells are in all cortical layers in each of the species examined. This distribution is roughly similar throughout all areas of rodent neocortex, but in monkey visual cortex AATase-immunoreactive neurons are more numerous in layers II-III, IVc, and VI. When combined with the findings of other studies, our results suggest that GLNase IR marks pyramidal neurons that use an excitatory amino acid transmitter. Antibody to AATase appears to mark intrinsic cortical neurons. The AATase immunoreactivity of these cells could indicate that they use an excitatory amino acid transmitter. However, their form and distribution in cortex suggest that this antibody labels GABAergic neurons.

Animals

Development of orientation selectivity in ferret visual cortex and effects of deprivation.

The orientation selectivity of cells in ferret primary visual cortex was studied during normal development and in animals deprived of vision or of visual cortical activity. In normal animals from the age when visual responses were first recorded (postnatal day 23) through postnatal week 5, only about 25% of cells showed orientation-selective responses. By postnatal week 7, cortical responses had matured to an adult-like state, with approximately 75% of cells clearly selective for orientation. This development of orientation selectivity was not merely a reflection of the development of cortical cell responsiveness: at all ages studied, there was no correlation between responsiveness and selectivity. Infusion of TTX into visual cortex to silence neuronal activity completely blocked the maturation of orientation selectivity. Visual deprivation by bilateral lid suture impaired but did not completely block the normal development of orientation selectivity. We conclude that the maturation of orientation-selective responses in ferret primary visual cortex requires cortical neuronal activity, and that normal development requires visually driven activity.

Animals

The effects of ablation of visual cortex in neonatal rabbits on the organization of retinothalamic and retinopretectal projections.

Primary visual cortex was ablated unilaterally in neonatal rabbits. Following a survival of 2-4 months, retrograde degeneration of the dorsal lateral geniculate nucleus (LGd) was assessed, and reorganization of retinofugal pathways was studied using methods of anretrograde transport of [3H]proline or of horseradish peroxidase. A complete lesion of primary visual cortex resulted in complete retrograde degeneration of the LGd with no sparing of any class of neurons. The terminations of retinofugal axons in the pretectum and thalamus were compared with those observed in normal animals. No major reorganization of ipsilateral retinofugal projections was observed in either the thalamus and pretectum ipsilateral to the ablated cortex, or in the thalamus and pretectum contralateral to the ablated cortex. However, contralateral retinofugal projections to the thalamus and to the pretectum ipsilateral to the ablated cortex were significantly different from normal. In the thalamus, the projections to the lateral posterior nucleus were expanded in area and increased in density. In the pretectum, the projections to the rostral pretectal areas were greatly increased in area, especially in the region of the olivary pretectal nucleus and posterior pretectal nucleus. However, the density of these projections was not increased relative to normal. Consideration of these results in relation to other published data on the anatomical consequences of neonatal visual cortex lesions, both in mammals which show behavioral sparing following neonatal visual cortex lesions and in mammals which, like the rabbit, show no behavioral sparing, suggests that: (1) behavioral sparing may correlate with patterns of survival or death of neurons in the thalamus and retina; and (2) reorganization of retinofugal pathways is not necessarily associated with behavioral sparing.

Animals

Intraocular injections of tetrodotoxin reduce transiently expressed acetylcholinesterase activity in developing rat visual cortex.

Geniculo-recipient layers of primary visual cortex in the rat display a transient pattern of acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity during the second postnatal week of life. Previous work has demonstrated that neonatal enucleations markedly reduce the transient AChE activity in visual cortex. The present studies were undertaken to determine the effects of reduced afferent neural activity on expression of the transient pattern of AChE activity. Rat pups received intraocular injections of tetrodotoxin (TTX) on postnatal days (PND) 3, 5, 7, 9 and 11 and were sacrificed on PND 12. Some animals were enucleated on PND 3. Brain sections were processed for AChE histochemistry and analyzed by optical densitometry. These experiments show that uniocular injections result in a markedly decreased level of AChE activity in layer IV of the medial part of cortical area 17 contralateral to the injected eye. The degree of reduction of AChE activity from repeated TTX injections was similar to the degree of reduction following enucleation on PND 3. Binocular injections of TTX result in a reduction of AChE activity in layer IV throughout cortical area 17, similar to the effects of binocular enucleation on PND 3. Experiments combining injection of horseradish peroxidase along with TTX on PND 11 demonstrate that retinal ganglion cells of TTX injected eyes are still capable of anterograde axonal transport. These data demonstrate that normal innervation and afferent activity are necessary for the transient expression of AChE activity by geniculocortical neurons.

Acetylcholinesterase

Lateral interactions in visual cortex.

The findings presented in these studies have brought out different ideas concerning the mechanisms of processing in primary visual cortex than were held at the outset. Rather than thinking of receptive fields as being restricted in their extent, with the process of integration of the components of an image occurring at a much later stage along the visual pathway, we have shown that the integrative process is a progressive one, beginning in the primary visual cortex (or perhaps even earlier) and building up in a cascading series of converging and diverging connections. Rather than thinking of the filter characteristics of a cell as being fixed, it is apparent that they are dynamic and can be modified by the context in which features are presented. Finally, rather than a cortex with a functional architecture that is fixed after a critical period ending in infancy, we find that perturbing the system can lead to long-term topographical reorganization. Other examples of contextual interactions have been demonstrated in the submodalities of motion, where a cell's directional selectivity is modulated by the presence of movement in the surround (Allman et al. 1985; Tanaka et al. 1986; Gulyas et al. 1987; Orban et al. 1987). In the domain of color, the phenomenon of color constancy, reported for cells in visual area V4 (Zeki 1983), also requires lateral interactions in visual space, comparing the wavelength distribution of light coming from surfaces in different parts of the visual field. The influences presented in these studies, as in our own work in the domain of orientation, are modulatory. The long-term changes in cortical topography following removal of somatosensory input (Merzenich et al. 1984, 1988) or by retinal lesions suggest that with the appropriate manipulations the lateral interactions can be enhanced to the point of activating the postsynaptic cells. Although retinal lesions clearly represent an abnormal disruption of sensory input, they may nevertheless be representative of long-term reorganizations of neural networks occurring under normal circumstances, such as those required for memory.

Animals

[Types of receptive fields of neurons in different laminae of the rabbit visual cortex].

Neurons of the primary rabbit visual cortex were classified into 7 large groups according to features of their receptive fields. The neurons with receptive fields were mostly revealed in the layers IV and VI, those with uniform directional receptive fields--in layer V, those with simple I-in layer VI, those with simple II--in layer II + III, and those with hypercomplex--in layer IV. The neurons with concentric receptive fields and those without responses to visual stimuli were equally distributed over the layers. The data obtained in rabbits, cats, and monkeys suggest that the tendency towards function stratification of primary visual cortex is successive in an evolutionary order of mammals.

Animals

Quantitative analysis of a vulnerable subset of pyramidal neurons in Alzheimer's disease: II. Primary and secondary visual cortex.

In this study we investigated the primary and secondary visual areas of normal and Alzheimer's disease brains by using the SMI32 antibody. It is known that in Alzheimer's disease primary sensory areas are usually less devastated than association cortices, although visual symptomatology has been documented early in the course of the disease. In area 17, the SMI32 antibody primarily labeled the perikarya and dentritic tree of the large Meynert cells and cells in layer IVB. Smaller neurons in layers III, V, and VI were also immunoreactive (ir). In area 18, very large SMI32-ir pyramidal neurons in layers III and V were observed. In both areas, staining intensity was correlated with cell size, the largest neurons being the most intensely stained. Only a few changes were observed in the Alzheimer's disease cases. The only statistically significant differences in SMI32-ir neuron counts between control and Alzheimer's disease brains occurred in layer IVB cells and Meynert cells in area 17, and in layer III cells in area 18. In contrast with association cortices, there were no changes in staining intensity in the visual areas. There were fewer neurofibrillary tangles and neuritic plaques in these areas than in prefrontal and inferior temporal cortex, and a correlation between neurofibrillary tangle counts and SMI32-ir neuron loss was only observed in layer III of area 18. These observations show that in the primary and secondary visual cortex, SMI32 also labeled a distinct subset of pyramidal cells that are known from data obtained in the monkey brain to furnish long corticocortical as well as subcortical projections. Interestingly, although there is much less cell and/or neurofibrillary tangle formation in these occipital regions than in prefrontal and temporal association areas, there is significant loss within key subsets of pyramidal cells. The selective loss of this particular subpopulation of pyramidal neurons will disrupt association pathways linking primary visual cortex with areas involved in higher level visual processing. The partial disconnection of such pathways may be relevant to the visual symptomatology frequently observed in Alzheimer's disease patients. These data further support the hypothesis that subtypes of pyramidal neurons with specific anatomical and molecular profiles may display a differential vulnerability in Alzheimer's disease.

Aged

Coherent oscillations: a mechanism of feature linking in the visual cortex? Multiple electrode and correlation analyses in the cat.

Primary visual coding can be characterized by the receptive field (RF) properties of single neurons. Subject of this paper is our search for a global, second coding step beyond the RF-concept that links related features in a visual scene. In recent models of visual coding, oscillatory activities have been proposed to constitute such linking signals. We tested the neurophysiological relevance of this hypothesis for the visual system. Single and multiple spikes as well as local field potentials were recorded simultaneously from several locations in the primary visual cortex (A17 and A18) using 7 or 19 individually advanceable fiber-microelectrodes (250 or 330 microns apart). Stimulus-evoked (SE)-resonances of 35-85 Hz were found in these three types of signals throughout the visual cortex when the primary coding channels were activated by their specific stimuli. Stimulus position, orientation, movement direction and velocity, ocularity and stationary flicker caused specific SE-resonances. Coherent SE-resonances were found at distant cortical positions when at least one of the primary coding properties was similar. Coherence was found 1) within a vertical cortex column, 2) between neighbouring hypercolumns, and 3) between two different cortical areas. We assume that the coherence of SE-resonances is mediated by recurrent excitatory intra- and inter-areal connections via phase locking between assemblies that represent the linking features of the actual visual scene. Visually related activities are, thus, transiently labelled by a temporal code that signalizes their momentary association.

Action Potentials

Relationship between intrinsic connections and functional architecture revealed by optical imaging and in vivo targeted biocytin injections in primate striate cortex.

In primate primary visual cortex, neurons sharing similar response properties are clustered together forming functional domains that appear as a mosaic of patches or bands, often traversing the entire cortical depth from the pia to the white matter. Similarly, each cortical site connects laterally through an extensive network of intrinsic projections that are organized in multiple clusters (patches) and reach distances of up to a few millimeters. The relationship between the functional domains and these laterally connected patches has remained a controversial issue despite intensive research efforts. To investigate this relationship, we obtained high-resolution functional maps of the cortical architecture by in vivo optical imaging. Subsequently, extracellular injections of the sensitive anterograde tracer biocytin were targeted into selected functional domains. Within the ocular dominance system, we found that long-range intrinsic connections tended to link the monocular regions of same-eye ocular dominance columns. Furthermore, we discovered that binocular domains formed a separate set of connections in area V1; binocular regions were selectively connected among themselves but were not connected to strictly monocular regions, suggesting that they constitute a distinct columnar system. In the other subsystem subserving orientation preference, patches of intrinsic connections tended to link domains sharing similar orientation preferences. Analyses of the precision of these connections indicated that in both functional subsystems, < 15% of the connections were between domains having orthogonal response properties. However, their selectivity was limited; approximately 30% +/- 10% of the interconnected patches contained neurons exhibiting orientation tuning that differed from those found at the injection sites by at least 45 degrees. At short range (up to 400 microns from the injection site), this casual trend seemed markedly accentuated; the local, synaptic-rich axonal and dendritic arbors crossed freely through columns of diverse functional properties. These complex sets of connections can endow cortical neurons with a rich diversity of response properties and broad tuning.

Animals

Single unit receptive fields in rabbit primary binocular cortex.

The receptive fields of 125 single units recorded from the binocular region of rabbit primary visual cortex have been analysed. The population of 43% radially symmetric, 23% directional, and 23% orientation selective units is similar to that of rabbit monocular visual cortex. The relative scarcity of orientation selective units and the absence of orientation columns differentiates rabbit from cat primary visual cortex. However, the majority of binocular units had similar receptive fields in each eye and very unconventional receptive fields were not encountered. Tested binocular units demonstrated summation upon simultaneous stimulation of both receptive fields. In conjunction with findings reported elsewhere, these results suggest that rabbit and cat possess a similar provision for binocular vision in spite of some differences in their cortical organisation.

Animals