Effects of superior temporal polysensory area lesions on eye movements in the macaque monkey

1995 ◽  
Vol 73 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. P. Scalaidhe ◽  
T. D. Albright ◽  
H. R. Rodman ◽  
C. G. Gross
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Smooth Pursuit ◽  
Temporal Cortex ◽  
Saccadic Eye Movements ◽  
Saccade Latency ◽  
Vertical Meridian ◽  
Central Fixation Point ◽  
Visuomotor Behavior ◽  
Visual Targets ◽  
Central Fixation

1. On the basis of its anatomic connections and single-unit properties, the superior temporal polysensory area (STP) would seem to be primarily involved in visuospatial functions. We have examined the effects of lesions of STP on saccadic eye movements, visual fixation, and smooth pursuit eye movements to directly test the hypothesis that STP is involved in visuospatial and visuomotor behavior. 2. Seven monkeys were trained to make saccades to targets 8, 15, and 22 degrees from a central fixation point along the horizontal meridian and 8 degrees from the central fixation point along the vertical meridian. One monkey was also trained to make saccades to auditory targets. The same monkeys were trained to foveate a stationary central fixation point and to follow it with a smooth pursuit eye movement when it began moving 5, 13, or 20 degrees/s. Four monkeys received unilateral STP lesions, one received a bilateral STP lesion, and as a control, two received unilateral inferior temporal cortex (IT) lesions. After testing, three of the animals with unilateral STP lesions received an additional STP lesion in the hemisphere contralateral to the first lesion. Similarly, one animal with a unilateral IT lesion received an additional IT lesion in the hemisphere contralateral to the first lesion. 3. All monkeys with complete removal of STP showed a significant increase in saccade latency to the most peripheral contralateral target, and most also had increased saccade latencies to the other contralateral targets. Saccades directed to targets along the vertical meridian or toward targets in the hemifield ipsilateral to the lesion were not impaired by removal of STP. By contrast, IT lesions did not impair the monkeys' ability to make saccadic eye movements to visual stimuli at any location, showing that saccades to visually guided targets are not impaired nonspecifically by damage to visual cortex. 4. The deficit in making eye movements after STP lesions was specific to saccade latency, with little effect on the accuracy of saccades to visual targets. 5. In the one monkey trained to make saccades to auditory targets, removal of STP did not impair saccades to auditory targets contralateral to its lesion, despite this monkey showing the largest increase in saccades latencies to visual targets. 6. There was complete recovery of saccade latency to the baseline level of performance on the saccade task after all STP lesions.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)

Altered Control of Visual Fixation and Saccadic Eye Movements in Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

2003 ◽  
Vol 90 (1) ◽  
pp. 503-514 ◽  
Author(s):  
Douglas P. Munoz ◽  
Irene T. Armstrong ◽  
Karen A. Hampton ◽  
Kimberly D. Moore
Keyword(s):  
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder ◽  
Eye Movements ◽  
Attention Deficit ◽  
Reaction Times ◽  
Saccadic Eye Movements ◽  
Stimulus Presentation ◽  
Central Fixation Point ◽  
Hyperactivity Disorder ◽  
Saccade Task ◽  
Central Fixation

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is characterized by the overt symptoms of impulsiveness, hyperactivity, and inattention. A frontostriatal pathophysiology has been hypothesized to produce these symptoms and lead to reduced ability to inhibit unnecessary or inappropriate behavioral responses. Oculomotor tasks can be designed to probe the ability of subjects to generate or inhibit reflexive and voluntary responses. Because regions of the frontal cortex and basal ganglia have been identified in the control of voluntary responses and saccadic suppression, we hypothesized that children and adults diagnosed with ADHD may have specific difficulties in oculomotor tasks requiring the suppression of reflexive or unwanted saccadic eye movements. To test this hypothesis, we measured eye movement performance in pro- and anti-saccade tasks of 114 ADHD and 180 control participants ranging in age from 6 to 59 yr. In the pro-saccade task, participants were instructed to look from a central fixation point toward an eccentric visual target. In the anti-saccade task, stimulus presentation was identical, but participants were instructed to suppress the saccade to the stimulus and instead look from the central fixation point to the side opposite the target. The state of fixation was manipulated by presenting the target either when the central fixation point was illuminated (overlap condition) or at some time after it disappeared (gap condition). In the pro-saccade task, ADHD participants had longer reaction times, greater intra-subject variance, and their saccades had reduced peak velocities and increased durations. In the anti-saccade task, ADHD participants had greater difficulty suppressing reflexive pro-saccades toward the eccentric target, increased reaction times for correct anti-saccades, and greater intra-subject variance. In a third task requiring prolonged fixation, ADHD participants generated more intrusive saccades during periods when they were required to maintain steady fixation. The results suggest that ADHD participants have reduced ability to suppress unwanted saccades and control their fixation behavior voluntarily, a finding that is consistent with a fronto-striatal pathophysiology. The findings are discussed in the context of recent neurophysiological data from nonhuman primates that have identified important control signals for saccade suppression that emanate from frontostriatal circuits.

scholarly journals Saccades and smooth pursuit eye movements trigger equivalent gaze-cued orienting effects

2018 ◽  
Vol 71 (9) ◽  
pp. 1860-1872 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen RH Langton ◽  
Alex H McIntyre ◽  
Peter JB Hancock ◽  
Helmut Leder
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Smooth Pursuit ◽  
Target Location ◽  
Eye Gaze ◽  
Saccadic Eye Movements ◽  
Gaze Shift ◽  
The Gaze ◽  
Orienting Effect ◽  
Motion Speed ◽  
Uncued Target

Research has established that a perceived eye gaze produces a concomitant shift in a viewer’s spatial attention in the direction of that gaze. The two experiments reported here investigate the extent to which the nature of the eye movement made by the gazer contributes to this orienting effect. On each trial in these experiments, participants were asked to make a speeded response to a target that could appear in a location toward which a centrally presented face had just gazed (a cued target) or in a location that was not the recipient of a gaze (an uncued target). The gaze cues consisted of either fast saccadic eye movements or slower smooth pursuit movements. Cued targets were responded to faster than uncued targets, and this gaze-cued orienting effect was found to be equivalent for each type of gaze shift both when the gazes were un-predictive of target location (Experiment 1) and counterpredictive of target location (Experiment 2). The results offer no support for the hypothesis that motion speed modulates gaze-cued orienting. However, they do suggest that motion of the eyes per se, regardless of the type of movement, may be sufficient to trigger an orienting effect.

Recasting the Smooth Pursuit Eye Movement System

2004 ◽  
Vol 91 (2) ◽  
pp. 591-603 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard J. Krauzlis
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Brain Stem ◽  
Smooth Pursuit ◽  
Visual Motion ◽  
Saccadic Eye Movements ◽  
Extrastriate Cortex ◽  
High Acuity ◽  
Voluntary Eye Movements ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
The Brain

Primates use a combination of smooth pursuit and saccadic eye movements to stabilize the retinal image of selected objects within the high-acuity region near the fovea. Pursuit has traditionally been viewed as a relatively automatic behavior, driven by visual motion signals and mediated by pathways that connect visual areas in the cerebral cortex to motor regions in the cerebellum. However, recent findings indicate that this view needs to be reconsidered. Rather than being controlled primarily by areas in extrastriate cortex specialized for processing visual motion, pursuit involves an extended network of cortical areas, and, of these, the pursuit-related region in the frontal eye fields appears to exert the most direct influence. The traditional pathways through the cerebellum are important, but there are also newly identified routes involving structures previously associated with the control of saccades, including the basal ganglia, the superior colliculus, and nuclei in the brain stem reticular formation. These recent findings suggest that the pursuit system has a functional architecture very similar to that of the saccadic system. This viewpoint provides a new perspective on the processing steps that occur as descending control signals interact with circuits in the brain stem and cerebellum responsible for gating and executing voluntary eye movements. Although the traditional view describes pursuit and saccades as two distinct neural systems, it may be more accurate to consider the two movements as different outcomes from a shared cascade of sensory–motor functions.

scholarly journals Apparent Position of Visual Targets during Real and Simulated Saccadic Eye Movements

1997 ◽  
Vol 17 (20) ◽  
pp. 7941-7953 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Concetta Morrone ◽  
John Ross ◽  
David C. Burr
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Saccadic Eye Movements ◽  
Apparent Position ◽  
Visual Targets

Contribution of the Cerebellar Flocculus to Gaze Control during Active Head Movements

1999 ◽  
Vol 81 (6) ◽  
pp. 3105-3109 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Belton ◽  
R. A. McCrea
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Cerebellar Cortex ◽  
Smooth Pursuit ◽  
Head Movements ◽  
Gaze Control ◽  
Smooth Pursuit Eye Movements ◽  
Ocular Pursuit ◽  
Pursuit Eye Movements ◽  
Cerebellar Flocculus ◽  
Visual Targets

Contribution of the cerebellar flocculus to gaze control during active head movements. The flocculus and ventral paraflocculus are adjacent regions of the cerebellar cortex that are essential for controlling smooth pursuit eye movements and for altering the performance of the vestibulo-ocular reflex (VOR). The question addressed in this study is whether these regions of the cerebellum are more globally involved in controlling gaze, regardless of whether eye or active head movements are used to pursue moving visual targets. Single-unit recordings were obtained from Purkinje (Pk) cells in the floccular region of squirrel monkeys that were trained to fixate and pursue small visual targets. Cell firing rate was recorded during smooth pursuit eye movements, cancellation of the VOR, combined eye-head pursuit, and spontaneous gaze shifts in the absence of targets. Pk cells were found to be much less sensitive to gaze velocity during combined eye–head pursuit than during ocular pursuit. They were not sensitive to gaze or head velocity during gaze saccades. Temporary inactivation of the floccular region by muscimol injection compromised ocular pursuit but had little effect on the ability of monkeys to pursue visual targets with head movements or to cancel the VOR during active head movements. Thus the signals produced by Pk cells in the floccular region are necessary for controlling smooth pursuit eye movements but not for coordinating gaze during active head movements. The results imply that individual functional modules in the cerebellar cortex are less involved in the global organization and coordination of movements than with parametric control of movements produced by a specific part of the body.

Effects of Antisocial Personality, Cocaine and Opioid Dependence, and Gender on Eye Movement Control

2004 ◽  
Vol 95 (2) ◽  
pp. 551-563 ◽  
Author(s):  
Natalie A. Ceballos ◽  
Lance O. Bauer
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Eye Movement ◽  
Smooth Pursuit ◽  
Opioid Dependence ◽  
Psychiatric Symptoms ◽  
Saccadic Eye Movements ◽  
Cocaine Dependence ◽  
Opiate Dependence ◽  
Antisocial Personality ◽  
Smooth Pursuit Eye Movement

Substance-dependent patients have been reported to exhibit abnormal smooth pursuit and saccadic eye movements. However, contrasts of the effects of different substances and the effects of comorbid psychiatric symptoms such as antisocial personality have rarely been performed. Separate analyses examined the effects of cocaine dependence, opioid dependence, or antisocial personality disorder. In each analysis, sex was included as an additional grouping factor. The dependent measures were the gain of smooth pursuit eye movement and the delay and accuracy of saccadic eye movement. Analyses of covariance indicated that both cocaine dependence and antisocial personality, but not opiate dependence, were associated with a significant reduction in gain of smooth pursuit eye movement. Cocaine dependence and antisocial personality also slowed the onset of saccadic eye movements, but only in men. No group differences were found in the accuracy of saccadic eye movements. The results suggest that the neurophysiological effects of cocaine dependence and antisocial personality overshadow the effects of heroin. The significance of these findings for visual attention and reading skill has yet to be assessed.

Effects of Strabismic Amblyopia and Strabismus without Amblyopia on Visuomotor Behavior, I: Saccadic Eye Movements

2012 ◽  
Vol 53 (12) ◽  
pp. 7458 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ewa Niechwiej-Szwedo ◽  
Manokaraananthan Chandrakumar ◽  
Herbert C. Goltz ◽  
Agnes M. F. Wong
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Saccadic Eye Movements ◽  
Strabismic Amblyopia ◽  
Visuomotor Behavior
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