2013.12.09
Visual Map Shifts based on Whisker-Guided Cues in the Young Mouse Visual Cortex
（Cell Rep. 2013 Dec 12;5(5):1365-74. doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2013.11.006. Epub 2013 Dec 5.）
Yoshitake K1,3, Tsukano H1, Tohmi M1, Komagata S1, Hishida R1, Yagi T2,3, Shibuki K1,3
1Department of Neurophysiology, Brain Research Institute, Niigata University
2KOKORO-Biology Group, Laboratories for Integrated Biology, Graduate School of Frontier Biosciences, Osaka University
3Japan Science and Technology Agency, CREST
Abstract
Mice navigate nearby space using their vision and whiskers, and young mice learn to integrate these heterogeneous inputs in perceptual space. We found that cortical responses were depressed in the primary visual cortex of young mice after wearing a monocular prism. This depression was uniformly observed in the primary visual cortex and was eliminated by whisker trimming or lesions in the posterior parietal cortex. Compensatory visual map shifts of responses elicited via the eye that had worn the prism were also observed. As a result, cortical responses elicited via each eye were clearly separated when a visual stimulus was placed in front of the mice. A comparison of response areas before and after prism wearing indicated that the map shifts were produced by depression with spatial eccentricity. Visual map shifts based on whisker-guided cues may serve as a model for investigating the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying higher sensory integration in the mammalian brain.
*Reprinted under a CC BY 3.0 license.
Related BRI Department
- Neurophysiology
