Experiments have concentrated on the investigation of the smooth pursuit eye movement system, which keeps the fovea of the eye centered on a moving target, and of the rapid or saccadic eye movement system, which moves the fovea of the eye from one object of interest to another in the visual field. The pursuit system studies concentrated on the recovery of the ability to make pursuit eye movements following punctate lesions in the middle temporal cerebral cortical area (MT) as a model for studying the recovery of function following cerebral cortical damage. We found that large lesions that eliminated multiple areas related to visual motion processing produced deficits in the generation of pursuit that did not recover fully in 7 months. The contribution of other cortical areas beyond these motion-related areas was found to be limited. A neuronal correlate of this recovery is expansion of receptive fields in areas of MT cortex adjacent to the lesion. This receptive field expansion could provide information about the region of the visual field previously served by the damaged cells. Studies of the saccadic system concentrated on neuronal activity in the superior colliculus. Altering saccadic eye movements by electrical stimulation of the colliculus further supports the model showing that superior colliculus activity is part of a feedback control system in the brainstem that controls the amplitude and the velocity in saccadic eye movement. Cans in the rostral pole of the colliculus were found to be related to the fixation of gaze by the monkey, suggesting that these cells may be related to a neural system that controls when the monkey makes a saccadic eye movement.
| Berman, Rebecca A; Joiner, Wilsaan M; Cavanaugh, James et al. (2009) Modulation of presaccadic activity in the frontal eye field by the superior colliculus. J Neurophysiol 101:2934-42 |
| Sommer, Marc A; Wurtz, Robert H (2008) Brain circuits for the internal monitoring of movements. Annu Rev Neurosci 31:317-38 |
| Sommer, Marc A; Wurtz, Robert H (2008) Visual perception and corollary discharge. Perception 37:408-18 |
| Wurtz, Robert H (2008) Neuronal mechanisms of visual stability. Vision Res 48:2070-89 |
| McAlonan, Kerry; Cavanaugh, James; Wurtz, Robert H (2008) Guarding the gateway to cortex with attention in visual thalamus. Nature 456:391-4 |
| Sommer, Marc A; Wurtz, Robert H (2006) Influence of the thalamus on spatial visual processing in frontal cortex. Nature 444:374-7 |
| Nakahara, Hiroyuki; Morita, Kenji; Wurtz, Robert H et al. (2006) Saccade-related spread of activity across superior colliculus may arise from asymmetry of internal connections. J Neurophysiol 96:765-74 |
| Cavanaugh, James; Alvarez, Bryan D; Wurtz, Robert H (2006) Enhanced performance with brain stimulation: attentional shift or visual cue? J Neurosci 26:11347-58 |
| McAlonan, Kerry; Cavanaugh, James; Wurtz, Robert H (2006) Attentional modulation of thalamic reticular neurons. J Neurosci 26:4444-50 |
| Hanes, Doug P; Smith, Mitchell K; Optican, Lance M et al. (2005) Recovery of saccadic dysmetria following localized lesions in monkey superior colliculus. Exp Brain Res 160:312-25 |
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