Intracortical Interactions for Orientation Contrast.
Abstract
To further our understanding of visual perception at the cellular level, recordings have been made from single neurons in the visual cortex (Area 17) of the cat. It is known that the visual scene is dissected at this level of the visual system according to stimulus attributes of objects in the real world such as color, depth, direction of motion, and orientation as well as position in the visual field. The selectivity of neurons for stimulus orientation has been particularly studied under this contract. The existence of consistent error in perceived orientation has long been known. Such orientation contrast effects are a component in many well-known optical illusions or figural illusions . Mechanisms have been sought in striate cortex (Area 17) which would explain these sensory coding errors. Both inhibitory and facilitatory interactions have been discovered and studied. Their properties are appropriate for a mechanisms of certain other perceptual effects as well as for orientation contrast. Further study of intracortical interactions would provide the knowledge for synthesizing into higher percepts the local visual analysis we now understood on a cell-by-cell basis. (Author)
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- May 31, 1982
- Accession Number
- ADA123326
Entities
People
- Jeremiah I. Nelson
Organizations
- NYU Langone Health