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Reid Lab |
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Optical Imaging of Single Neurons in Visual Cortex For the past year, we have been using two-photon microscopy and calcium imaging to make functional images of the visual cortex with single-cell resolution. This has allowed us to watch neurons as they respond to visual stimuli. We have found that the functional micro-architecture of cat visual cortex – the relationship between where neurons are and what they do – is extraordinarily precise. These neurons respond best to bars with a specific orientation and direction of motion. We found sharp boundaries between regions where neurons respond to opposite direction of motion. These boundaries are one or two cells wide. In the rat visual cortex, the functional micro-architecture is completely different. At the finest scale, at the level of neighboring neurons, there is no relationship between the location of a neuron and the orientation of a stimulus that makes the neuron fire. (Work by Kenichi Ohki, Sooyoung Chung, Yeang Ch'ng, and Prakash Kara; See Society for Neuroscience Abstracts, 2004).
R. Clay Reid, MD, PhD Department of Neurobiology Harvard Medical School 220 Longwood Ave., Goldenson 203 Boston, MA 02115-5701 617 432 3621 clay_reid at hms.harvard.edu
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