Neuronal stereoscopic processing following extraocular... : NeuroReport (original) (raw)

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Neuronal stereoscopic processing following extraocular proprioception deafferentation

Trotter, Yves; Celebrini, Simona; Beaux, Jean Christophe; Grandjean, Bernard

Institut Des Neurosciences, Laboratoire des Neurosciences de la vision, 9, Quai Saint Bernard, Université P. et M. Curie, Paris 6, 75005 Paris, France

Abstract

In adult cats, after section of extraocular muscle pro-prioceptive (EOMP) afferents during the 'critical period', most cortical area 17 cells loose their ability to discriminate changes in binocular spatial disparity. After unilateral section this loss depends on whether or not cortical cells modulate their responses to the presentation of sinusoidal gratings linearly. For 'modulated cells', this loss is due to a reduction of binocular suppression while for 'unmodulated cells', it is due to a selective increase in the variability of the binocular response. These permanent neural dysfunctions show that balance in EOMP inflow plays a crucial role in cortical processing of binocular depth discrimination.