The visual field representation in striate cortex of the macaque monkey: Asymmetries, anisotropies, and individual variability

doi:10.1016/0042-6989(84)90041-5

Vision Research

Volume 24, Issue 5, 1984, Pages 429-448

https://doi.org/10.1016/0042-6989(84)90041-5 Get rights and content

Abstract

The topographic organization of striate cortex in the macaque was studied using physiological recording techniques. Results were displayed on two-dimensional maps of the cortex, which facilitated the quantitative analysis of various features of the visual representation. The representation was found to be asymmetric, with more cortex devoted to lower than to upper fields. Over much of striate cortex the representation is anisotropic, in that the magnification factor depends upon the direction along which it is measured. There is considerable individual variability in these features as well as in the overall size of striate cortex. Outside the fovea, the cortical representation shows only modest deviations from a logarithmic conformai mapping, in which the magnification factor is proportional to the inverse of eccentricity in the visual field. Comparison of receptive field size with cortical magnification was used to estimate the “point image size” in the cortex (i.e. the extent of cortex concerned with processing inputs from any given point in the visual field). Our evidence supports a previous report that point-image size varies significantly with eccentricity. This is of interest in relation to anatomical evidence that the dimensions of columnar systems in striate cortex are largely independent of eccentricity.

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Citation Excerpt :
E2 can be considered as a special case of a reference eccentricity. Note further that, unlike the location equations often used in the retinotopy literature (Van Essen et al., 1984, in the introduction; Duncan & Boynton, 2003; Larsson & Heeger, 2006), the equations are well defined in the fovea centre: for d = 0, the eccentricity E is zero, as it should be. What reference to choose is up to the experimenter.
The retino-cortical visual pathway is retinotopically organized: Neighbourhood relationships on the retina are preserved in the mapping. Size relationships in that mapping are also highly regular: The size of a patch in the visual field that maps onto a cortical patch of fixed size follows, along any radius and over a wide range, simply a linear function with retinal eccentricity. As a consequence, the mapping of retinal to cortical locations follows a logarithmic function along that radius. While this has already been shown by Fischer (1973, Vision Research, 13, 2113–2120), the link between the linear function – which describes the local behaviour by the cortical magnification factor M – and the logarithmic location function for the global behaviour, has never been made explicit. The present paper provides such a link as a set of ready-to-use equations using Levi and Klein’s E₂ nomenclature, and examples for their validity and applicability in the mapping literature are discussed. The equations allow estimating M in the retinotopic centre; values thus derived from the literature show enormous, hitherto unnoticed, variability. A new structural parameter, d₂, is proposed to characterize the cortical map, as a counterpart to E₂; it shows much more stability. One pitfall is discussed and spelt out, namely the common myth that a pure logarithmic function, without constant term, will give an adequate map. The correct equations are finally extended to describe the cortical map of Bouma’s law on visual crowding. The result contradicts recent suggestions that critical crowding distance corresponds to constant cortical distance.
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^*: Present address: Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research, Building 10, Room 6C420, NIH, Bethesda, MD 20205, U.S.A.

^°: Present address: Psychology Department E25-634, MIT, Cambridge, MA 02139, U.S.A.

View full text

The visual field representation in striate cortex of the macaque monkey: Asymmetries, anisotropies, and individual variability

Abstract

Brain Res.

Vision Res.

Vision Res.

Brain Res.

Vision Res.

Vision Res.

Am. J. Ophthal.

Some quantitative aspects of the cat's eye: axis and plane of reference, visual field co-ordinates and optics

J. Physiol.

Cell ratios in the thalamo-cortical visual system of Macaco mulatto

J. comp. Neurol.

The laminar organization and cell content of the lateral geniculate body in the monkey

J. Anat.

The representation of the visual field in parvicellular and magnocellular laminae of the lateral geniculate nucleus in the macaque monkey

J. comp. Neurol.

The complete pattern of ocular dominance stripes in macaque striate cortex

Soc. Neurosci. Abstr.

A neurophysiological determination of the vertical horopter in the cat and owl

J. comp. Neurol.

The representation of the visual field on the cerebral cortex in monkeys

J. Physiol.

The nature of the boundary between cortical visual areas II and III in the cat

Magnification factor and receptive field size in foveal striate cortex of the monkey

Expl Brain Res.

Uber die Variabilitat der grosshirnrindenstruktur. Mitteilung II. Regio occipitalis beim erwachsenen Menshchen

J. Psychol. Neurol.

Visual topography of V2 in the macaque

J. comp. Neurol.

Representation of fovea in the striate cortex of vervet monkey. Cercopithecus aethiops pygerythrus

Vision Res.

Immunocytochemical localization of glutamic acid decar☐ylase in monkey striate cortex

Nature

Cytochrome oxidase stain preferentially labels intersection of ocular dominance and vertical orientation column in macaque striate cortex

Soc. Neurosci. Abstr.