title: Cortical stimulation consolidates and reactivates visual experience: neural plasticity from magnetic entrainment of visual activity.
abstract: Delivering transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) shortly after the end of a visual stimulus can cause a TMS-induced 'replay' or 'visual echo' of the visual percept. In the current study, we find an entrainment effect that after repeated elicitations of TMS-induced replay with the same visual stimulus, the replay can be induced by TMS alone, without the need for the physical visual stimulus. In Experiment 1, we used a subjective rating task to examine the phenomenal aspects of TMS-entrained replays. In Experiment 2, we used an objective masking paradigm to quantitatively validate the phenomenon and to examine the involvement of low-level mechanisms. Results showed that the TMS-entrained replay was not only phenomenally experienced (Exp.1), but also able to hamper letter identification (Exp.2). The findings have implications in several directions: (1) the visual cortical representation and iconic memory, (2) experience-based plasticity in the visual cortex, and (3) their relationship to visual awareness.
authors.affiliation: Division of Biology, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E California Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91125, USA. liao.hsini@lab.ntt.co.jp
authors.forename: Hsin-I
authors.initials: HI
authors.lastname: Liao
authors.forename: Daw-An
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.forename: Neil
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Halelamien
authors.forename: Shinsuke
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Shimojo
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D006801:Humans; D009473:Neuronal Plasticity / Q000502:physiology; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D050781:Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation; D014793:Visual Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*