title: Multisensory Interplay Within Human Auditory Cortex: New Evidence from Intraoperative Optical Imaging of Intrinsic Signal.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The primary auditory cortex, which was previously considered to be unisensory, has been shown to be multisensory. However, the temporal details of processing nonauditory stimuli in the human auditory cortex remain unclear, owing to the low temporal and spatial resolution of the adopted imaging techniques.
  
  
  METHODS
  Using intraoperative optical imaging of intrinsic signals recording techniques, detailed cortical activations within the auditory cortex in response to auditory and somatosensory stimulation were recorded from 3 intraoperative anesthetized patients with brain tumors located in the superior temporal gyrus.
  
  
  RESULTS
  At both green-light (545 nm ± 13) and red-light (610 nm ± 10) illumination, the primary and secondary auditory cortices responded significantly to the somatosensory stimulation. As induced by the somatosensory stimulus, the average overlapping rate of the activated region was 74.51% ± 0.15, and the peak responding time occurred at poststimulus 7-8 seconds. There was no significant difference in the peak responding time between auditory and somatosensory stimuli (P < 0.01, paired t test).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These findings provide novel evidence for multisensory interplay within human auditory cortex at an early stage of cortical processing, which extends the understanding of multisensory mechanisms of human brain functions.
authors: Department of Neurosurgery, Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University, Changsha, China; School of Materials Science and Engineering, Central South University, Changsha, China.
authors: Qian
authors: Q
authors: Zhou
authors: Institute of Advanced Manufacturing Technology, Hefei Institutes of Physical Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changzhou, China.
authors: Yucheng
authors: Y
authors: Wang
authors: Department of Neurosurgery, Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University, Changsha, China.
authors: Lei
authors: L
authors: Yi
authors: Department of Neurosurgery, Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University, Changsha, China.
authors: Zhigang
authors: Z
authors: Tan
authors: Department of Neurosurgery, Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University, Changsha, China. Electronic address: yugang_jiang@sina.com.
authors: Yugang
authors: Y
authors: Jiang
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation / Q000379:methods*; D000328:Adult; D001303:Auditory Cortex / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000502:physiology*; D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology; D001932:Brain Neoplasms / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000601:surgery; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D064795:Intraoperative Neurophysiological Monitoring / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D061848:Optical Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D010812:Physical Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D013003:Somatosensory Cortex / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000502:physiology; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000601:surgery
keywords: Auditory cortex; Human brain; Multisensory; Optical imaging of intrinsic signals; Somatosensory