Processing of animated contours by single cells in visual cortex area 18 of the cat.
In view of previous evidence that area 17 and 18 cells in cats represent the first level contour abstraction, we decided to study the specific response pattern of these cells to shapes enriched with contours, such as animated objects (AO). AO (cat's body whole contours) and 4 levels of AO degraded patterns were presented monocularly and repeatedly to the same eye, within the cells' RF. The intact AO elicited stronger responses than degraded contours while the responses to various degradedAO were similar. We conclude that under monocular presentation of AO cells react mainly as "edge detectors": the best stimulus is closed, compared with open, contour.
Bregman
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T
Physiological Laboratory, Goldschleger Eye Research Institute, Tel-Aviv University Faculty of Medicine, Sheba Medical Center, Tel-Hashomer, Israel. bregmant@netscape.net
Yinon
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U
D000818:Animals; D002415:Cats; D009039:Motion Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D009474:Neurons / Q000502:physiology*; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D014793:Visual Cortex / Q000502:physiology*