Temporal and parietal cortical areas project to area V1 in the monkey

2000 ◽  
Vol 38 ◽  
pp. S72
Author(s):  
K Rockland
Keyword(s):  
Author(s):  
B. Damião ◽  
W. C. Rossi-Junior ◽  
F. D. R. Guerra ◽  
P. P. Marques ◽  
D. A. Nogueira ◽  
...  

Abstract Anabolic substances have been increasingly used by bodybuilders and athletes with the goal of improving performance and aesthetics. However, this practice has caused some concern to physicians and researchers because of unknowledge of consequences that the indiscriminate and illicit use of these substances can cause. Thus, this study analyzed the effects of two commercially available anabolic steroids (AS), Winstrol Depot® (Stanozolol) and Deposteron® (Testosterone Cypionate), in the neuronal density of limbic, motor and sensory regions on the cerebral cortex and in CA1, CA2, CA3 regions of the hippocampus. A total of 60 Swiss mice were used (30 males and 30 females), separated into three groups: control and two experimental groups, which received the AAS. From each brain, homotypic and semi-serial samples were taken in frontal sections from areas established for the study. The results showed that females treated with testosterone cypionate presented a reduction in all regions tested and the ones treated with Stanozolol showed a decrease in some hippocampal areas. Regarding male animals, stanozolol led to a decrease in neuron number in one hippocampal region. These data allow us to conclude that supra-physiological doses of steroids used in this study, can cause considerable damage to nervous tissue with ultrastructural and consequently behavioral impairment. These changes could interfere with the loss of physical yield and performance of athletes and non-athletes and may cause irreparable damage to individuals making irresponsible use of anabolic steroids.


2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roel M. Willems ◽  
Franziska Hartung

Behavioral evidence suggests that engaging with fiction is positively correlated with social abilities. The rationale behind this link is that engaging with fictional narratives offers a ‘training modus’ for mentalizing and empathizing. We investigated the influence of the amount of reading that participants report doing in their daily lives, on connections between brain areas while they listened to literary narratives. Participants (N=57) listened to two literary narratives while brain activation was measured with fMRI. We computed time-course correlations between brain regions, and compared the correlation values from listening to narratives to listening to reversed speech. The between-region correlations were then related to the amount of fiction that participants read in their daily lives. Our results show that amount of fiction reading is related to functional connectivity in areas known to be involved in language and mentalizing. This suggests that reading fiction influences social cognition as well as language skills.


Author(s):  
Ray Guillery

My thesis studies had stimulated an interest in the mamillothalamic pathways but also some puzzlement because we knew nothing about the nature of the messages passing along these pathways. Several laboratories were studying the thalamic relay of sensory pathways with great success during my post-doctoral years. Each sensory relay could be understood in terms of the appropriate sensory input, but we had no way of knowing the meaning of the mamillothalamic messages. I introduce these nuclei as an example of the many thalamic nuclei about whose input functions we still know little or nothing. Early clinical studies of mamillary lesions had suggested a role in memory formation, whereas evidence from cortical lesions suggested a role in emotional experiences. Studies of the smallest of the three nuclei forming these pathways then showed it to be concerned with sensing head direction, relevant but not sufficient for defining an animal’s position in space. More recent studies based on studies of cortical activity or cortical damage have provided a plethora of suggestions: as so often, the answers reported depend on the questions asked. That simple conclusion is relevant for all transthalamic pathways. The evidence introduced in Chapter 1, that thalamocortical messages have dual meanings, suggests that we need to rethink our questions. It may prove useful to look at the motor outputs of relevant cortical areas to get clues about some appropriate questions.


2011 ◽  
Vol 105 (4) ◽  
pp. 1558-1573 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu-Ting Mao ◽  
Tian-Miao Hua ◽  
Sarah L. Pallas

Sensory neocortex is capable of considerable plasticity after sensory deprivation or damage to input pathways, especially early in development. Although plasticity can often be restorative, sometimes novel, ectopic inputs invade the affected cortical area. Invading inputs from other sensory modalities may compromise the original function or even take over, imposing a new function and preventing recovery. Using ferrets whose retinal axons were rerouted into auditory thalamus at birth, we were able to examine the effect of varying the degree of ectopic, cross-modal input on reorganization of developing auditory cortex. In particular, we assayed whether the invading visual inputs and the existing auditory inputs competed for or shared postsynaptic targets and whether the convergence of input modalities would induce multisensory processing. We demonstrate that although the cross-modal inputs create new visual neurons in auditory cortex, some auditory processing remains. The degree of damage to auditory input to the medial geniculate nucleus was directly related to the proportion of visual neurons in auditory cortex, suggesting that the visual and residual auditory inputs compete for cortical territory. Visual neurons were not segregated from auditory neurons but shared target space even on individual target cells, substantially increasing the proportion of multisensory neurons. Thus spatial convergence of visual and auditory input modalities may be sufficient to expand multisensory representations. Together these findings argue that early, patterned visual activity does not drive segregation of visual and auditory afferents and suggest that auditory function might be compromised by converging visual inputs. These results indicate possible ways in which multisensory cortical areas may form during development and evolution. They also suggest that rehabilitative strategies designed to promote recovery of function after sensory deprivation or damage need to take into account that sensory cortex may become substantially more multisensory after alteration of its input during development.


2020 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 239821282097977
Author(s):  
Christoffer J. Gahnstrom ◽  
Hugo J. Spiers

The hippocampus has been firmly established as playing a crucial role in flexible navigation. Recent evidence suggests that dorsal striatum may also play an important role in such goal-directed behaviour in both rodents and humans. Across recent studies, activity in the caudate nucleus has been linked to forward planning and adaptation to changes in the environment. In particular, several human neuroimaging studies have found the caudate nucleus tracks information traditionally associated with that by the hippocampus. In this brief review, we examine this evidence and argue the dorsal striatum encodes the transition structure of the environment during flexible, goal-directed behaviour. We highlight that future research should explore the following: (1) Investigate neural responses during spatial navigation via a biophysically plausible framework explained by reinforcement learning models and (2) Observe the interaction between cortical areas and both the dorsal striatum and hippocampus during flexible navigation.


Author(s):  
Sigrid Hegna Ingvaldsen ◽  
Tora Sund Morken ◽  
Dordi Austeng ◽  
Olaf Dammann

AbstractResearch on retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) focuses mainly on the abnormal vascularization patterns that are directly visible for ophthalmologists. However, recent findings indicate that children born prematurely also exhibit changes in the retinal cellular architecture and along the dorsal visual stream, such as structural changes between and within cortical areas. Moreover, perinatal sustained systemic inflammation (SSI) is associated with an increased risk for ROP and the visual deficits that follow. In this paper, we propose that ROP might just be the tip of an iceberg we call visuopathy of prematurity (VOP). The VOP paradigm comprises abnormal vascularization of the retina, alterations in retinal cellular architecture, choroidal degeneration, and abnormalities in the visual pathway, including cortical areas. Furthermore, VOP itself might influence the developmental trajectories of cerebral structures and functions deemed responsible for visual processing, thereby explaining visual deficits among children born preterm.


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