Responses of Neurons in the Nucleus of the Basal Optic Root to Translational and Rotational Flowfields

1999 ◽  
Vol 81 (1) ◽  
pp. 267-276 ◽  
Author(s):  
Douglas R. W. Wylie ◽  
Barrie J. Frost
Keyword(s):  
Optic Flow ◽  
Horizontal Plane ◽  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Mesencephalic Reticular Formation ◽  
Companion Paper ◽  
Direction Selectivity ◽  
Large Field ◽  
Adjacent Area

Wylie, Douglas R. W. and Barrie J. Frost. Responses of Neurons in the nucleus of the basal optic root to translational and rotational flowfields. J. Neurophysiol. 81: 267–276, 1999. The nucleus of the basal optic root (nBOR) receives direct input from the contralateral retina and is the first step in a pathway dedicated to the analysis of optic flowfields resulting from self-motion. Previous studies have shown that most nBOR neurons exhibit direction selectivity in response to large-field stimuli moving in the contralateral hemifield, but a subpopulation of nBOR neurons has binocular receptive fields. In this study, the activity of binocular nBOR neurons was recorded in anesthetized pigeons in response to panoramic translational and rotational optic flow. Translational optic flow was produced by the “translator” projector described in the companion paper, and rotational optic flow was produced by a “planetarium projector” described by Wylie and Frost. The axis of rotation or translation could be positioned to any orientation in three-dimensional space. We recorded from 37 cells, most of which exhibited a strong contralateral dominance. Most of these cells were located in the caudal and dorsal aspects of the nBOR complex and many were localized to the subnucleus nBOR dorsalis. Other units were located outside the boundaries of the nBOR complex in the adjacent area ventralis of Tsai or mesencephalic reticular formation. Six cells responded best to rotational flowfields, whereas 31 responded best to translational flowfields. Of the rotation cells, three preferred rotation about the vertical axis and three preferred horizontal axes. Of the translation cells, 3 responded best to a flowfield simulating downward translation of the bird along a vertical axis, whereas the remaining 28 responded best to flowfields resulting from translation along axes in the horizontal plane. Seventeen of these cells preferred a flowfield resulting from the animal translating backward along an axis oriented ∼45° to the midline, but the best axes of the remaining eleven cells were distributed throughout the horizontal plane with no definitive clustering. These data are compared with the responses of vestibulocerebellar Purkinje cells.

scholarly journals Electromechanical Catastrophe

2016 ◽  
Vol 08 (07) ◽  
pp. 1640005 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tongqing Lu ◽  
Sibo Cheng ◽  
Tiefeng Li ◽  
Tiejun Wang ◽  
Zhigang Suo
Keyword(s):  
Nonlinear System ◽  
Horizontal Plane ◽  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Mechanical Force ◽  
The State ◽  
Constant Force ◽  
Constant Voltage ◽  
Three Dimensional Space

A transducer is a system that couples two loads. For example, an electromechanical transducer couples a mechanical force and an electrical voltage. A two-load, nonlinear system can exhibit rich behavior of bifurcation, which can be displayed in a three-dimensional space, with the horizontal plane representing the two loads, and the vertical axis representing the state of the system. In this three-dimensional space, a state of equilibrium at fixed loads corresponds to a point on a surface. The surface is smooth, but its projection to the load plane results in singularities of two types: fold and cusp. Here we identify the fold and cusp for a dielectric elastomer transducer by a combination of experiment and calculation. We conduct two kinds of experiment: electrical actuation under a constant force and mechanical pulling under a constant voltage. The theory and the experiment agree well. The fold and cusp are essential in the design of loading paths to avoid or harness the bifurcation.

Navigating in a volumetric world: Metric encoding in the vertical axis of space

2013 ◽  
Vol 36 (5) ◽  
pp. 546-547 ◽  
Author(s):  
Theresa Burt de Perera ◽  
Robert Holbrook ◽  
Victoria Davis ◽  
Alex Kacelnik ◽  
Tim Guilford
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Information ◽  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Vertical Component ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Orthogonal Axis ◽  
Experimental Protocols ◽  
Three Dimensional Space ◽  
The Way

AbstractAnimals navigate through three-dimensional environments, but we argue that the way they encode three-dimensional spatial information is shaped by how they use the vertical component of space. We agree with Jeffery et al. that the representation of three-dimensional space in vertebrates is probably bicoded (with separation of the plane of locomotion and its orthogonal axis), but we believe that their suggestion that the vertical axis is stored “contextually” (that is, not containing distance or direction metrics usable for novel computations) is unlikely, and as yet unsupported. We describe potential experimental protocols that could clarify these differences in opinion empirically.

Spatial Alignment of Rotational and Static Tilt Responses of Vestibulospinal Neurons in the Cat

1999 ◽  
Vol 82 (2) ◽  
pp. 855-862 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. I. Perlmutter ◽  
Y. Iwamoto ◽  
J. F. Baker ◽  
B. W. Peterson
Keyword(s):  
Horizontal Plane ◽  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Body Position ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Whole Body ◽  
Angular Difference ◽  
Spatial Alignment ◽  
Minimum Sensitivity ◽  
Alert Cats ◽  
Vestibulospinal Neurons

The responses of vestibulospinal neurons to 0.5-Hz, whole-body rotations in three-dimensional space and static tilts of whole-body position were studied in decerebrate and alert cats. The neurons’ spatial properties for earth-vertical rotations were characterized by maximum and minimum sensitivity vectors ( R max and R min) in the cat’s horizontal plane. The orientation of a neuron’s R max was not consistently related to the orientation of its maximum sensitivity vector for static tilts ( T max). The angular difference between R max and T max was widely distributed between 0° and 150°, and R max and T max were aligned (i.e., within 45° of each other) for only 44% (14/32) of the neurons. The alignment of R max and T max was not correlated with the neuron’s sensitivity to earth-horizontal rotations, or to the orientation of R max in the horizontal plane. In addition, the extent to which a neuron exhibited spatiotemporal convergent (STC) behavior in response to vertical rotations was independent of the angular difference between R max and T max. This suggests that the high incidence of STC responses in our sample (56%) reflects not only canal-otolith convergence, but also the presence of static and dynamic otolith inputs with misaligned directionality. The responses of vestibulospinal neurons reflect a complex combination of static and dynamic vestibular inputs that may be required by postural reflexes that vary depending on head, trunk, and limb orientation, or on the frequency of stimulation.

scholarly journals Viewing-patterns and perspectival painting: An eye-tracking study on the effect of the vanishing point

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur Crucq
Keyword(s):  
Eye Tracking ◽  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Picture Plane ◽  
Linear Perspective ◽  
Underlying Structure ◽  
Vanishing Point ◽  
Visual Feature ◽  
The Gaze

Linear perspective has long been used to create the illusion of three-dimensional space on the picture plane. One of its central axioms comes from Euclidean geometry and holds that all parallel lines converge in a single vanishing point. Although linear perspective provided the painter with a means to organize the painting, the question is whether the gaze of the beholder is also affected by the underlying structure of linear perspective: for instance, in such a way that the orthogonals leading to the vanishing point also automatically guides the beholder’s gaze. This was researched during a pilot study by means of an eye-tracking experiment at the Lab for Cognitive Research in Art History (CReA) of the University of Vienna. It appears that in some compositions the vanishing point attracts the view of the participant. This effect is more significant when the vanishing point coincides with the central vertical axis of the painting, but is even stronger when the vanishing point also coincides with a major visual feature such as an object or figure. The latter calls into question what exactly attracts the gaze of the viewer, i.e., what comes first: the geometrical construct of the vanishing point or the visual feature?

scholarly journals Three-dimensional tuning of head direction cells in rats

2019 ◽  
Vol 121 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael E. Shinder ◽  
Jeffrey S. Taube
Keyword(s):  
Horizontal Plane ◽  
Reference Frames ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Ventral Surface ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Head Direction ◽  
Horizontal Canal ◽  
Cell Responses ◽  
The Earth

Head direction (HD) cells fire when the animal faces that cell’s preferred firing direction (PFD) in the horizontal plane. The PFD response when the animal is oriented outside the earth-horizontal plane could result from cells representing direction in the plane of locomotion or as a three-dimensional (3D), global-referenced direction anchored to gravity. To investigate these possibilities, anterodorsal thalamic HD cells were recorded from restrained rats while they were passively positioned in various 3D orientations. Cell responses were unaffected by pitch or roll up to ~90° from the horizontal plane. Firing was disrupted once the animal was oriented >90° away from the horizontal plane and during inversion. When rolling the animal around the earth-vertical axis, cells were active when the animal’s ventral surface faced the cell’s PFD. However, with the rat rolled 90° in an ear-down orientation, pitching the rat and rotating it around the vertical axis did not produce directionally tuned responses. Complex movements involving combinations of yaw-roll, but usually not yaw-pitch, resulted in reduced directional tuning even at the final upright orientation when the rat had full visual view of its environment and was pointing in the cell’s PFD. Directional firing was restored when the rat’s head was moved back-and-forth. There was limited evidence indicating that cells contained conjunctive firing with pitch or roll positions. These findings suggest that the brain’s representation of directional heading is derived primarily from horizontal canal information and that the HD signal is a 3D gravity-referenced signal anchored to a direction in the horizontal plane. NEW & NOTEWORTHY This study monitored head direction cell responses from rats in three dimensions using a series of manipulations that involved yaw, pitch, roll, or a combination of these rotations. Results showed that head direction responses are consistent with the use of two reference frames simultaneously: one defined by the surrounding environment using primarily visual landmarks and a second defined by the earth’s gravity vector.

scholarly journals The Life Mission Theory III. Theory of Talent

2003 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 1286-1293 ◽  
Author(s):  
Soren Ventegodt ◽  
Niels Jorgen Andersen ◽  
Joav Merrick
Keyword(s):  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Natural State ◽  
Human Form ◽  
The World ◽  
Sex And Sexuality ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Third Dimension

When we acknowledge our purpose as the essence of our self, when we take all our power into use in an effortless way, and when we fully accept our own nature — including sex and sexuality, our purpose of life takes the form of a unique talent. Using this talent gives the experience of happiness. A person in his natural state of being uses his core talent in a conscious, joyful, and effortless way, contributing to the world the best he or she has to offer. Full expression of self happens when a person, in full acceptance of body and life, with whole-hearted intension, uses all his personal powers to realize his core talent and all associated talents, to contribute to his beloved and to the world. Thus, self-actualisation is a result of a person fully expressing and realizing his core talent.The theory of talent states that a core talent can be expressed optimally when a human being takes possession of a three-dimensional space with the axis of purpose, power and gender, as we have a threefold need: 1-Acknowledging our core talent (our purpose of life) and intending it 2-Understanding our potential powers and manifesting them 3-Accepting our human form including our sex and expressing itThe first dimension is spiritual, the next dimension is mental, emotional and physical, and the third dimension is bodily and sexual. We manifest our talents in a giving movement from the bottom of our soul trough our biological nature onto the subject and object of the outer world. These three dimensions can be drawn as three axes, one saggital axis called purpose or love or me-you, one vertical axis called power or consciousness (light) or heaven-earth, and one horizontal axis called gender or joy or male-female. The three core dimensions of human existence are considered of equal importance for expression of our life purpose, life mission, or core talent. Each of the dimensions is connected to special needs. When these needs are not fulfilled, we suffer and if this suffering becomes unbearable we deny the dimension or a part of is. This is why the dimensions of purpose, power and gender become suppressed from our consciousness.

Responses of pigeon vestibulocerebellar neurons to optokinetic stimulation. II. The 3-dimensional reference frame of rotation neurons in the flocculus

1993 ◽  
Vol 70 (6) ◽  
pp. 2647-2659 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. R. Wylie ◽  
B. J. Frost
Keyword(s):  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Receptive Fields ◽  
Semicircular Canals ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Horizontal Axis ◽  
Monocular Stimulation ◽  
Contralateral Eye ◽  
Ipsilateral Stimulation ◽  
Stimulation Of

1. The complex spike activity of Purkinje cells in the flocculus in response to rotational flowfields was recorded extracellularly in anesthetized pigeons. 2. The optokinetic stimulus was produced by a rotating “planetarium projector.” A light source was placed in the center of a tin cylinder, which was pierced with numerous small holes. A pen motor oscillated the cylinder about its long axis. This apparatus was placed above the bird's head and the resultant rotational flow-field was projected onto screens that surrounded the bird on all four sides. The axis of rotation of the planetarium could be oriented to any position in three-dimensional space. 3. Two types of responses were found: vertical axis (VA; n = 43) neurons responded best to visual rotation about the vertical axis, and H-135i neurons (n = 34) responded best to rotation about a horizontal axis. The preferred orientation of the horizontal axis was at approximately 135 degrees ipsilateral azimuth. VA neurons were excited by rotation about the vertical axis producing forward (temporal to nasal) and backward motion in the ipsilateral and contralateral eyes, respectively, and were inhibited by rotation in the opposite direction. H-135i neurons in the left flocculus were excited by counterclockwise rotation about the 135 degrees ipsilateral horizontal axis and were inhibited by clockwise motion. Thus, the VA and H-135i neurons, respectively, encode visual flowfields resulting from head rotations stimulating the ipsilateral horizontal and ipsilateral anterior semicircular canals. 4. Sixty-seven percent of VA and 80% of H-135i neurons had binocular receptive fields, although for most binocular cells the ipsilateral eye was dominant. Binocular stimulation resulted in a greater depth of modulation than did monocular stimulation of the dominant eye for 69% of the cells. 5. Monocular stimulation of the VA neurons revealed that the best axis for the contralateral eye was tilted back 11 degrees, on average, to the best axis for ipsilateral stimulation. For the H-135i neurons, the best axes for monocular stimulation of the two eyes were approximately the same. 6. By stimulating circumscribed portions of the monocular receptive fields of the H-135i neurons with alternating upward and downward largefield motion, it was revealed that the contralateral receptive fields were bipartite. Upward motion was preferred in the anterior 45 degrees of the contralateral field, and downward motion, was preferred in the central 90 degrees of the contralateral visual field.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)

Three-dimensional organization of optokinetic responses in the rabbit

1993 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
pp. 303-317 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. S. Tan ◽  
J. van der Steen ◽  
J. I. Simpson ◽  
H. Collewijn
Keyword(s):  
Control System ◽  
Horizontal Plane ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Horizontal Axis ◽  
Constant Speed ◽  
Slow Phase ◽  
Optokinetic Stimulation ◽  
Axis Orientation ◽  
Maximum Gain

1. Three-dimensional rotations of both eyes were measured in alert rabbits during optokinetic stimulation about axes lying in the horizontal plane or about an earth-vertical axis, with either one or both eyes viewing the stimulus. Optokinetic stimulus speed was 2 degrees /s, either continuous or alternating in polarity (triangular stimulus). In addition to the gains of the responses, the orientations of the response axes relative to the stimulus axes were determined. 2. In comparison to the response to constant-speed optokinetic stimulation about the vertical axis, the response to constant-speed optokinetic stimulation about horizontal axes was characterized by the lack of a speed buildup. In many cases, slow phase tracking was good as long as the eye was within the central oculomotor range but deteriorated when eye deviation became more eccentric and fast phases failed to be generated. These features suggest that the optokinetic reflex about horizontal axes functions as a position-control system, rather than as a velocity-control system. 3. Binocular optokinetic stimulation at constant speed (2 degrees/s) about the roll axis (0 degrees azimuth horizontal axis) elicited disconjugate responses. Although the gain of the response was not significantly different in the two eyes (0.38 for downward and 0.44 for upward stimulation), the response axes of the two eyes differed by as much as 51 degrees. 4. Monocular, horizontal axis optokinetic stimulation at constant speed elicited responses that were grossly dissociated between the two eyes. The magnitude of the responses was anisotropic in that it varied with the azimuthal orientation of the stimulus axis; the maximum gain for each eye (0.41 for the seeing and 0.33 for the covered eye) was at 135 degrees azimuth for each eye. The axis orientation and direction (sense of rotation) of the optokinetic stimulus eliciting the maximal response for each eye coincided with the optic flow normally associated with the maximal excitation of the corresponding ipsilateral anterior canal. 5. Binocular, triangular optokinetic stimulation with small excursions (+/- 10 degrees), which avoided the saturation problems of constant-speed stimulation, elicited adequate responses without systematic directional asymmetries. Gain was approximately 0.9 for all stimulus axis orientations in the horizontal plane. 6. During monocular stimulation with triangular stimuli, the response of the seeing eye showed a gain of approximately 0.5 for all orientations of the stimulus axis. In contrast, the covered eye showed anisotropic responses, with a maximum gain of approximately 0.5 during stimulation of the seeing eye about its 45 degree axis.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)

scholarly journals Three-dimensional space: locomotory style explains memory differences in rats and hummingbirds

2014 ◽  
Vol 281 (1784) ◽  
pp. 20140301 ◽  
Author(s):  
I. Nuri Flores-Abreu ◽  
T. Andrew Hurly ◽  
James A. Ainge ◽  
Susan D. Healy
Keyword(s):  
Horizontal Plane ◽  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Vertical Component ◽  
Horizontal Component ◽  
Vertical Dimension ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Two Dimensional ◽  
With Memory ◽  
Three Dimensional Space

While most animals live in a three-dimensional world, they move through it to different extents depending on their mode of locomotion: terrestrial animals move vertically less than do swimming and flying animals. As nearly everything we know about how animals learn and remember locations in space comes from two-dimensional experiments in the horizontal plane, here we determined whether the use of three-dimensional space by a terrestrial and a flying animal was correlated with memory for a rewarded location. In the cubic mazes in which we trained and tested rats and hummingbirds, rats moved more vertically than horizontally, whereas hummingbirds moved equally in the three dimensions. Consistent with their movement preferences, rats were more accurate in relocating the horizontal component of a rewarded location than they were in the vertical component. Hummingbirds, however, were more accurate in the vertical dimension than they were in the horizontal, a result that cannot be explained by their use of space. Either as a result of evolution or ontogeny, it appears that birds and rats prioritize horizontal versus vertical components differently when they remember three-dimensional space.

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