Reduced Occipital Alpha Power Indexes Enhanced Excitability Rather than Improved Visual Perception

Movement planning and execution rely on the anticipation and online control of the incoming sensory input. Evidence suggests that sensorimotor processes may synchronize visual rhythmic activity in preparation of action performance. Indeed, we recently reported periodic fluctuations of visual contrast sensitivity that are time-locked to the onset of an intended movement of the arm. However, the origin of the observed visual modulations has so far remained unclear because of the endogenous (and thus temporally undetermined) activation of the sensorimotor system that is associated with voluntary movement initiation. In this study, we activated the sensorimotor circuitry involved in the hand control in an exogenous and controlled way by means of peripheral stimulation of the median nerve and characterized the spectrotemporal dynamics of the ensuing visual perception. The stimulation of the median nerve triggers robust and long-lasting (∼1 s) alpha-band oscillations in visual perception, whose strength is temporally modulated in a way that is consistent with the changes in alpha power described at the neurophysiological level after sensorimotor stimulation. These findings provide evidence in support of a causal role of the sensorimotor system in modulating oscillatory activity in visual areas with consequences for visual perception. NEW & NOTEWORTHY This study shows that the peripheral activation of the somatomotor hand system triggers long-lasting alpha periodicity in visual perception. This demonstrates that not only the endogenous sensorimotor processes involved in movement preparation but also the passive stimulation of the sensorimotor system can synchronize visual activity. The present work suggests that oscillation-based mechanisms may subserve core (task independent) sensorimotor integration functions.

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Cortical entrainment to hierarchical contextual rhythms recomposes dynamic attending in visual perception

10.1101/2020.12.21.423786 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Peijun Yuan ◽

Ruichen Hu ◽

Xue Zhang ◽

Ying Wang ◽

Yi Jiang

Keyword(s):

Visual Perception ◽

Conscious Experience ◽

Dynamic Environment ◽

Higher Order ◽

Alpha Power ◽

Time Dimension ◽

Information Selection ◽

Delta Band ◽

Neural Entrainment ◽

Cortical Entrainment

AbstractTemporal regularity is ubiquitous and essential to guiding attention and coordinating behavior within a dynamic environment. Previous researchers have modeled attention as an internal rhythm that may entrain to first-order regularity from rhythmic events to prioritize information selection at specific time points. Using the attentional blink paradigm, here we show that higher-order regularity based on rhythmic organization of contextual features (pitch, color, or motion) may serve as a temporal frame to recompose the dynamic profile of visual temporal attention. Critically, such attentional reframing effect is well predicted by cortical entrainment to the higher-order contextual structure at the delta band as well as its coupling with the stimulus-driven alpha power. These results suggest that the human brain involuntarily exploits multiscale regularities in rhythmic contexts to recompose dynamic attending in visual perception, and highlight neural entrainment as a central mechanism for optimizing our conscious experience of the world in the time dimension.

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Prefrontal cortex modulates posterior alpha oscillations during top-down guided visual perception

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ◽

10.1073/pnas.1705965114 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 114 (35) ◽

pp. 9457-9462 ◽

Cited By ~ 36

Author(s):

Randolph F. Helfrich ◽

Melody Huang ◽

Guy Wilson ◽

Robert T. Knight

Keyword(s):

Visual Perception ◽

Alpha Activity ◽

Alpha Power ◽

Top Down ◽

Visual Stream ◽

Alpha Oscillations ◽

Fine Grained ◽

Oscillatory Dynamics ◽

Delta Activity ◽

And Behavior

Conscious visual perception is proposed to arise from the selective synchronization of functionally specialized but widely distributed cortical areas. It has been suggested that different frequency bands index distinct canonical computations. Here, we probed visual perception on a fine-grained temporal scale to study the oscillatory dynamics supporting prefrontal-dependent sensory processing. We tested whether a predictive context that was embedded in a rapid visual stream modulated the perception of a subsequent near-threshold target. The rapid stream was presented either rhythmically at 10 Hz, to entrain parietooccipital alpha oscillations, or arrhythmically. We identified a 2- to 4-Hz delta signature that modulated posterior alpha activity and behavior during predictive trials. Importantly, delta-mediated top-down control diminished the behavioral effects of bottom-up alpha entrainment. Simultaneous source-reconstructed EEG and cross-frequency directionality analyses revealed that this delta activity originated from prefrontal areas and modulated posterior alpha power. Taken together, this study presents converging behavioral and electrophysiological evidence for frontal delta-mediated top-down control of posterior alpha activity, selectively facilitating visual perception.

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Cortical entrainment to hierarchical contextual rhythms recomposes dynamic attending in visual perception

eLife ◽

10.7554/elife.65118 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 10 ◽

Author(s):

Peijun Yuan ◽

Ruichen Hu ◽

Xue Zhang ◽

Ying Wang ◽

Yi Jiang

Keyword(s):

Visual Perception ◽

Conscious Experience ◽

Dynamic Environment ◽

Higher Order ◽

Alpha Power ◽

Time Dimension ◽

Information Selection ◽

Delta Band ◽

Neural Entrainment ◽

Cortical Entrainment

Temporal regularity is ubiquitous and essential to guiding attention and coordinating behavior within a dynamic environment. Previous researchers have modeled attention as an internal rhythm that may entrain to first-order regularity from rhythmic events to prioritize information selection at specific time points. Using the attentional blink paradigm, here we show that higher-order regularity based on rhythmic organization of contextual features (pitch, color, or motion) may serve as a temporal frame to recompose the dynamic profile of visual temporal attention. Critically, such attentional reframing effect is well predicted by cortical entrainment to the higher-order contextual structure at the delta band as well as its coupling with the stimulus-driven alpha power. These results suggest that the human brain involuntarily exploits multiscale regularities in rhythmic contexts to recompose dynamic attending in visual perception, and highlight neural entrainment as a central mechanism for optimizing our conscious experience of the world in the time dimension.

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Development of visual perception and attention, assessed by backward masking and application in children with epilepsy

Developmental Medicine & Child Neurology ◽

10.1017/s0012162203001026 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 45 (08) ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Marta Macchi ◽

Livia Nicoletta Rossi ◽

Ivan Cortinovis ◽

Lucia Menegazzo ◽

Sandra Maria Burri ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Visual Perception ◽

Backward Masking

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Visual Perception Modifies Goal-directed Movement Control: Supporting Evidence from a Visual Perturbation Paradigm

The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology Section A ◽

10.1080/027249897391865 ◽

1997 ◽

Vol 50 (4) ◽

pp. 726-741 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Luc Proteau Guillaume Masson

Keyword(s):

Visual Perception ◽

Movement Control ◽

Supporting Evidence ◽

Directed Movement ◽

Visual Perturbation

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Aberrant Sensorimotor Integration in Musicians' Cramp Patients

Journal of Psychophysiology ◽

10.1027/0269-8803.17.4.195 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 17 (4) ◽

pp. 195-202 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Vanessa K. Lim ◽

John L. Bradshaw ◽

Michael E.R. Nicholls ◽

Ian J. Kirk ◽

Jeff P. Hamm ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Movement Disorder ◽

Sensorimotor Cortex ◽

Sensorimotor Integration ◽

Group Interaction ◽

Focal Dystonia ◽

The Other ◽

Alpha Power ◽

Significant Group ◽

Group Interactions

AbstractSimple tapping and complex movements (Luria finger apposition task) were performed unimanually and bimanually by two groups of professional guitarists while EEG was recorded from electrodes over the sensorimotor cortex. One group had a task-specific movement disorder (focal dystonia or musicians' cramp), while the other group did not (controls). There were no significant group interactions in the task-related power (TRPow) within the alpha range of 8-10Hz (mu1). In contrast, there was a significant group interaction within the alpha range of 10-12Hz (mu2); these latter frequencies are associated with task-specific sensorimotor integration. The significant group interaction included task (simple and complex) by hand (left, right, and both) by electrodes (10 electrodes over the sensorimotor areas). In the rest conditions, the alpha power (10-12Hz) was comparable between the groups; during movement, however, compared to the controls, patients demonstrated the greatest TRPow (10-12Hz) over all conditions. This was particularly evident when patients used their affected hand and suggests that patients with musicians' cramp have impaired task-specific sensorimotor integration.

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