Abstract

The long-range goal of this research is to understand the neural mechanisms of selective visual attention at the level of the individual neuron and the cortical circuit, and to determine how these mechanisms affect perception and behavior. The conceptual starting point is the observation that the brain is limited in the amount of visual information it can process at any moment in time. For instance, when observers are asked to identify the objects in a briefly presented scene, they become less accurate as the number of objects increases. The proposed research will use a combination of visual psychophysics and single-unit physiology to test two alternative explanations for this capacity limitation, and to investigate the neural mechanisms that enable the brain to select behaviorally relevant stimuli from among irrelevant distracters. Insights from the proposed research are expected to help in understanding, diagnosis and treatment of neuropsychological disorders in which attentional mechanisms fail, such as neglect, Balint's syndrome, ADHD, and attentional aspects of autism.

  Funding Agency

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Eye Institute (NEI)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
3R01EY013802-02S1
Application #
6806830
Study Section
Visual Sciences B Study Section (VISB)
Program Officer
Oberdorfer, Michael
Project Start
2002-05-01
Project End
2006-04-30
Budget Start
2003-07-18
Budget End
2004-04-30
Support Year
2
Fiscal Year
2003
Total Cost
$23,000
Indirect Cost

  Institution

Name
Salk Institute for Biological Studies
Department
Type
DUNS #
078731668
City
La Jolla
State
CA
Country
United States
Zip Code
92037

  Publications

Mitchell, Jude F; Boisvert, Chantal J; Reuter, Jon D et al. (2014) Correction of refractive errors in rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) involved in visual research. Comp Med 64:300-8
Mitchell, Jude F; Boisvert, Chantal J; Reuter, Jon D et al. (2014) Correction of refractive errors in rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) involved in visual research. Comp Med 64:300-8
Nandy, Anirvan S; Sharpee, Tatyana O; Reynolds, John H et al. (2013) The fine structure of shape tuning in area V4. Neuron 78:1102-15
Anderson, Emily B; Mitchell, Jude F; Reynolds, John H (2013) Attention-dependent reductions in burstiness and action-potential height in macaque area V4. Nat Neurosci 16:1125-31
Sundberg, Kristy A; Mitchell, Jude F; Gawne, Timothy J et al. (2012) Attention influences single unit and local field potential response latencies in visual cortical area V4. J Neurosci 32:16040-50
Fallah, Mazyar; Reynolds, John H (2012) Contrast dependence of smooth pursuit eye movements following a saccade to superimposed targets. PLoS One 7:e37888
Anderson, Emily B; Mitchell, Jude F; Reynolds, John H (2011) Attentional modulation of firing rate varies with burstiness across putative pyramidal neurons in macaque visual area V4. J Neurosci 31:10983-92
Ciaramitaro, Vivian M; Mitchell, Jude F; Stoner, Gene R et al. (2011) Object-based attention to one of two superimposed surfaces alters responses in human early visual cortex. J Neurophysiol 105:1258-65
Khoe, Wayne; Mitchell, Jude F; Reynolds, John H et al. (2008) ERP evidence that surface-based attention biases interocular competition during rivalry. J Vis 8:18.1-11
Bodelon, Clara; Fallah, Mazyar; Reynolds, John H (2007) Temporal resolution for the perception of features and conjunctions. J Neurosci 27:725-30

Showing the most recent 10 out of 15 publications