Neural correlate of spatial (mis-)localization during smooth eye-movements

Abstract

The dependence of neuronal discharge on the position of the eyes in the orbit is a functional characteristic of many visual cortical areas of the macaque. It has been suggested that these eye-position signals provide relevant information for a coordinate transformation of visual signals into a non-eye-centered frame of reference. This transformation could be an integral part for achieving visual perceptual stability across eye movements. Previous studies demonstrated close to veridical eye-position decoding during stable fixation as well as characteristic erroneous decoding across saccadic eye-movements. Here we aimed to decode eye-position during smooth-pursuit. We recorded neural activity in macaque area VIP during steady fixation, saccades and smooth-pursuit and investigated the temporal and spatial accuracy of eye-position as decoded from the neuronal discharges. Confirming previous results, the activity of the majority of neurons depended linearly on horizontal and vertical eye-position. The application of a previously introduced computational approach (isofrequency-decoding) allowed eye-position decoding with considerable accuracy during steady fixation. We applied the same decoder on the activity of the same neurons during smooth-pursuit. On average, the decoded signal was leading the current eye position. A model combining this constant lead of the decoded eye-position with a previously described attentional bias ahead of the pursuit target describes the asymmetric mislocalization pattern for briefly flashed stimuli during smooth-pursuit eye-movements as found in human behavioral studies.

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