A major open - and very important - question in cognitive neuroscience is: how and where in the brain are decisions made? Recent electrophysiological evidence from a cerebral cortical area thought to play a key role in perceptual decision-making (LIP) suggests that the activity of neurons in area LIP do not reflect a gradual accumulation of evidence toward a decision. Furthermore, reversible inactivation of area LIP produces no change in decision-making performance, calling into question its causal role in visual perceptual decision- making. These unexpected results open the possibility that other sensorimotor areas play a critical role in the neuronal processing leading to perceptual decisions. Our goal is to expand on these recent findings and on our accomplishments made during previous award cycles to test the hypothesis that the basal ganglia (BG) and the superior colliculus (SC) play key roles in visual perceptual decision-making. We have two specific aims: 1) Determine the role of the superior colliculus (SC) in perceptual decision-making and, 2) determine the role of the inhibition from one output nucleus of the basal ganglia, the substantia nigra pars reticulata (nigra), to the SC in perceptual decision-making. We propose to use state of the art multiple neuron recording technologies to measure population activity in the SC and in the nigra while subjects perform visual perceptual decision tasks. We will employ analytical methods to model the behavioral data and make predictions about behavior using the population neuronal data. We will also employ cutting edge molecular genetic methods to manipulate neuronal activity to determine the causal role of these brain areas in perceptual decision-making.
How and where in the brain visual perceptual decisions are formed and made remains an open question. This application is a request to perform experiments designed to unravel the role of key midbrain and forebrain structures in visual perceptual decision-making.
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| Grimaldi, Piercesare; Hah Cho, Seong; Lau, Hakwan et al. (2018) Superior Colliculus Signals Decisions Rather Than Confidence: Analysis of Single Neurons. J Neurophysiol : |
| Crapse, Trinity B; Lau, Hakwan; Basso, Michele A (2018) A Role for the Superior Colliculus in Decision Criteria. Neuron 97:181-194.e6 |
| Basso, Michele A; May, Paul J (2017) Circuits for Action and Cognition: A View from the Superior Colliculus. Annu Rev Vis Sci 3:197-226 |
| Perugini, Alessandra; Ditterich, Jochen; Basso, Michele A (2016) Patients with Parkinson's Disease Show Impaired Use of Priors in Conditions of Sensory Uncertainty. Curr Biol 26:1902-10 |
| Basso, Michele A (2016) Monkey neurophysiology to clinical neuroscience and back again. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 113:6591-3 |
| Grimaldi, Piercesare; Lau, Hakwan; Basso, Michele A (2015) There are things that we know that we know, and there are things that we do not know we do not know: Confidence in decision-making. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 55:88-97 |
| Crapse, Trinity B; Basso, Michele A (2015) Insights into decision making using choice probability. J Neurophysiol 114:3039-49 |
| Mahamed, Safraaz; Garrison, Tiffany J; Shires, Joel et al. (2014) Stimulation of the substantia nigra influences the specification of memory-guided saccades. J Neurophysiol 111:804-16 |
| Powers, Alice S; Basso, Michele A; Evinger, Craig (2013) Blinks slow memory-guided saccades. J Neurophysiol 109:734-41 |
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