Thursday, October 16, 2008

Now you see it, now you don't

Each object can cast many different images on the eye. How can the brain combine different views of an object into a single object representation? Neurons at the inferior temporal cortex (brain area IT), the top processing level of the visual system, signal the presence of individual objects even if those objects appear in different positions.

Nuo Li and James J. DiCarlo in a report in Science Vol. 321, pp.1502-1507 recorded neuronal responses in area IT of two monkeys to different objects presented at the central position and 3 degrees above or below. By systematically swapping object identity between two objects whenever the monkey made a fast eye movement (saccade) to one particular position in the visual field, the response of the IT neuron became less selective to the objects at the swap position or even inverted its selectivity. Thus, object representations in area IT can change in a short period of time.

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