S38-6 Neural basis for associative face memory in the anterior inferior temporal cortex of monkeys

ABSTRACTTo expand our knowledge about the object recognition, it is critical to understand the role of spatial frequency (SF) in an object representation that occurs in the inferior temporal (IT) cortex at the final stage of processing the visual information across the ventral visual pathway. Object categories are being recognized hierarchically in at least three levels of abstraction: superordinate (e.g., animal), mid-level (e.g., human face), and subordinate (e.g., face identity). Psychophysical studies have shown rapid access to mid-level category information and low SF (LSF) contents. Although the hierarchical representation of categories has been shown to exist inside the IT cortex, the impact of SF on the multi-level category processing is poorly understood. To gain a deeper understanding of the neural basis of the interaction between SF and category representations at multiple levels, we examined the neural responses within the IT cortex of macaque monkeys viewing several SF-filtered objects. Each stimulus could be either intact or bandpass filtered into either the LSF (coarse shape information) or high SF (HSF) (fine shape information) bands. We found that in both High- and Low-SF contents, the advantage of mid-level representation has not been violated. This evidence suggests that mid-level category boundary maps are strongly represented in the IT cortex and remain unaffected with respect to any changes in the frequency content of stimuli. Our observations indicate the necessity of the HSF content for the superordinate category representation inside the IT cortex. In addition, our findings reveal that the representation of global category information is more dependent on the HSF than the LSF content. Furthermore, the lack of subordinate representation in both LSF and HSF filtered stimuli compared to the intact stimuli provide strong evidence that all SF contents are necessary for fine category visual processing.

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rTMS Induces Brain Functional and Structural Alternations in Schizophrenia Patient With Auditory Verbal Hallucination

Frontiers in Neuroscience ◽

10.3389/fnins.2021.722894 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 15 ◽

Author(s):

Yuanjun Xie ◽

Muzhen Guan ◽

Zhongheng Wang ◽

Zhujing Ma ◽

Huaning Wang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Clinical Symptoms ◽

Psychiatric Symptoms ◽

Visual Learning ◽

Verbal Learning ◽

Temporal Cortex ◽

Low Frequency ◽

Inferior Temporal Cortex ◽

Positive Symptoms ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Auditory Verbal Hallucination

BackgroundLow-frequency transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) over the left temporoparietal cortex reduces the auditory verbal hallucination (AVH) in schizophrenia. However, the underlying neural basis of the rTMS treatment effect for schizophrenia remains not well understood. This study investigates the rTMS induced brain functional and structural alternations and their associations with clinical as well as neurocognitive profiles in schizophrenia patients with AVH.MethodsThirty schizophrenia patients with AVH and thirty-three matched healthy controls were enrolled. The patients were administered by 15 days of 1 Hz rTMS delivering to the left temporoparietal junction (TPJ) area. Clinical symptoms and neurocognitive measurements were assessed at pre- and post-rTMS treatment. The functional (amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation, ALFF) and structural (gray matter volume, GMV) alternations were compared, and they were then used to related to the clinical and neurocognitive measurements after rTMS treatment.ResultsThe results showed that the positive symptoms, including AVH, were relieved, and certain neurocognitive measurements, including visual learning (VisLearn) and verbal learning (VerbLearn), were improved after the rTMS treatment in the patient group. Furthermore, the rTMS treatment induced brain functional and structural alternations in patients, such as enhanced ALFF in the left superior frontal gyrus and larger GMV in the right inferior temporal cortex. The baseline ALFF and GMV values in certain brain areas (e.g., the inferior parietal lobule and superior temporal gyrus) could be associated with the clinical symptoms (e.g., positive symptoms) and neurocognitive performances (e.g., VerbLearn and VisLearn) after rTMS treatment in patients.ConclusionThe low-frequency rTMS over the left TPJ area is an efficacious treatment for schizophrenia patients with AVH and could selectively modulate the neural basis underlying psychiatric symptoms and neurocognitive domains in schizophrenia.

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Faculty Opinions recommendation of Neural correlates of associative face memory in the anterior inferior temporal cortex of monkeys.

Faculty Opinions – Post-Publication Peer Review of the Biomedical Literature ◽

10.3410/f.7101956.7325054 ◽

2010 ◽

Author(s):

Marlene Behrmann

Keyword(s):

Temporal Cortex ◽

Neural Correlates ◽

Inferior Temporal Cortex ◽

Face Memory

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Neural microgenesis of personally familiar face recognition

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ◽

10.1073/pnas.1414929112 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 112 (35) ◽

pp. E4835-E4844 ◽

Cited By ~ 40

Author(s):

Meike Ramon ◽

Luca Vizioli ◽

Joan Liu-Shuang ◽

Bruno Rossion

Keyword(s):

Face Recognition ◽

Visual Information ◽

Medial Temporal Lobe ◽

Temporal Cortex ◽

Inferior Temporal Cortex ◽

Sufficient Information ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Familiar Face ◽

Spatial Frequencies ◽

The Face

Despite a wealth of information provided by neuroimaging research, the neural basis of familiar face recognition in humans remains largely unknown. Here, we isolated the discriminative neural responses to unfamiliar and familiar faces by slowly increasing visual information (i.e., high-spatial frequencies) to progressively reveal faces of unfamiliar or personally familiar individuals. Activation in ventral occipitotemporal face-preferential regions increased with visual information, independently of long-term face familiarity. In contrast, medial temporal lobe structures (perirhinal cortex, amygdala, hippocampus) and anterior inferior temporal cortex responded abruptly when sufficient information for familiar face recognition was accumulated. These observations suggest that following detailed analysis of individual faces in core posterior areas of the face-processing network, familiar face recognition emerges categorically in medial temporal and anterior regions of the extended cortical face network.

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Temporal dynamics of visual category representation in the macaque inferior temporal cortex

Journal of Neurophysiology ◽

10.1152/jn.00018.2016 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 116 (2) ◽

pp. 587-601 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

Mohammad-Reza A. Dehaqani ◽

Abdol-Hossein Vahabie ◽

Roozbeh Kiani ◽

Majid Nili Ahmadabadi ◽

Babak Nadjar Araabi ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Temporal Dynamics ◽

Temporal Cortex ◽

Category Boundary ◽

Shape Space ◽

Short Latency ◽

Inferior Temporal Cortex ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Category Information ◽

Subordinate Level ◽

Psychophysical Studies

Object categories are recognized at multiple levels of hierarchical abstractions. Psychophysical studies have shown a more rapid perceptual access to the mid-level category information (e.g., human faces) than the higher (superordinate; e.g., animal) or the lower (subordinate; e.g., face identity) level. Mid-level category members share many features, whereas few features are shared among members of different mid-level categories. To understand better the neural basis of expedited access to mid-level category information, we examined neural responses of the inferior temporal (IT) cortex of macaque monkeys viewing a large number of object images. We found an earlier representation of mid-level categories in the IT population and single-unit responses compared with superordinate- and subordinate-level categories. The short-latency representation of mid-level category information shows that visual cortex first divides the category shape space at its sharpest boundaries, defined by high/low within/between-group similarity. This short-latency, mid-level category boundary map may be a prerequisite for representation of other categories at more global and finer scales.

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