Dataset Information

A Differential Circuit via Retino-Colliculo-Pulvinar Pathway Enhances Feature Selectivity in Visual Cortex through Surround Suppression.

ABSTRACT: In the mammalian visual system, information from the retina streams into parallel bottom-up pathways. It remains unclear how these pathways interact to contribute to contextual modulation of visual cortical processing. By optogenetic inactivation and activation of mouse lateral posterior nucleus (LP) of thalamus, a homolog of pulvinar, or its projection to primary visual cortex (V1), we found that LP contributes to surround suppression of layer (L) 2/3 responses in V1 by driving L1 inhibitory neurons. This results in subtractive suppression of visual responses and an overall enhancement of orientation, direction, spatial, and size selectivity. Neurons in V1-projecting LP regions receive bottom-up input from the superior colliculus (SC) and respond preferably to non-patterned visual noise. The noise-dependent LP activity allows V1 to "cancel" noise effects and maintain its orientation selectivity under varying noise background. Thus, the retina-SC-LP-V1 pathway forms a differential circuit with the canonical retino-geniculate pathway to achieve context-dependent sharpening of visual representations.

SUBMITTER: Fang Q

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6996926 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

A Differential Circuit via Retino-Colliculo-Pulvinar Pathway Enhances Feature Selectivity in Visual Cortex through Surround Suppression.

Fang Qi Q Chou Xiao-Lin XL Peng Bo B Zhong Wen W Zhang Li I LI Tao Huizhong Whit HW

Neuron 20191204 2

In the mammalian visual system, information from the retina streams into parallel bottom-up pathways. It remains unclear how these pathways interact to contribute to contextual modulation of visual cortical processing. By optogenetic inactivation and activation of mouse lateral posterior nucleus (LP) of thalamus, a homolog of pulvinar, or its projection to primary visual cortex (V1), we found that LP contributes to surround suppression of layer (L) 2/3 responses in V1 by driving L1 inhibitory ne ...[more]

PMID: 31812514

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Project description:In the cat primary visual cortex, it is accepted that neurons optimally responding to similar stimulus orientations are clustered in a column extending from the superficial to deep layers. The cerebral cortex is, however, folded inside a skull, which makes gyri and fundi. The primary visual area of cats, area 17, is located on the fold of the cortex called the lateral gyrus. These facts raise the question of how to reconcile the tangential arrangement of the orientation columns with the curvature of the gyrus. In the present study, we show a possible configuration of feature representation in the visual cortex using a three-dimensional (3D) self-organization model. We took into account preferred orientation, preferred direction, ocular dominance and retinotopy, assuming isotropic interaction. We performed computer simulation only in the middle layer at the beginning and expanded the range of simulation gradually to other layers, which was found to be a unique method in the present model for obtaining orientation columns spanning all the layers in the flat cortex. Vertical columns of preferred orientations were found in the flat parts of the model cortex. On the other hand, in the curved parts, preferred orientations were represented in wedge-like columns rather than straight columns, and preferred directions were frequently reversed in the deeper layers. Singularities associated with orientation representation appeared as warped lines in the 3D model cortex. Direction reversal appeared on the sheets that were delimited by orientation-singularity lines. These structures emerged from the balance between periodic arrangements of preferred orientations and vertical alignment of the same orientations. Our theoretical predictions about orientation representation were confirmed by multi-slice, high-resolution functional MRI in the cat visual cortex. We obtained a close agreement between theoretical predictions and experimental observations. The present study throws a doubt about the conventional columnar view of orientation representation, although more experimental data are needed.

Dataset Information

A Differential Circuit via Retino-Colliculo-Pulvinar Pathway Enhances Feature Selectivity in Visual Cortex through Surround Suppression.

Publications

A Differential Circuit via Retino-Colliculo-Pulvinar Pathway Enhances Feature Selectivity in Visual Cortex through Surround Suppression.

Similar Datasets

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