Summary: Vestibular Convergence Patterns in Vestibular Nuclei Neurons of
Alert Primates
J. DAVID DICKMAN AND DORA E. ANGELAKI
Department of Research, Central Institute for the Deaf; and Department of Neurobiology, Washington University
School of Medicine, St. Louis, Missouri 63110
Received 18 July 2002; accepted in final form 14 August 2002
Dickman, J. David and Dora E. Angelaki. Vestibular convergence
patterns in vestibular nuclei neurons of alert primates. J Neurophysiol
88: 3518­3533, 2002; 10.1152/jn.00518.2002. Sensory signal con-
vergence is a fundamental and important aspect of brain function.
Such convergence may often involve complex multidimensional inter-
actions as those proposed for the processing of otolith and semicircular
canal (SCC) information for the detection of translational head move-
ments and the effective discrimination from physically congruent gravity
signals. In the present study, we have examined the responses of primate
rostral vestibular nuclei (VN) neurons that do not exhibit any eye move-
ment-related activity using 0.5-Hz translational and three-dimensional
(3D) rotational motion. Three distinct neural populations were identified.
Approximately one-fourth of the cells exclusively encoded rotational
movements (canal-only neurons) and were unresponsive to translation.

Source: Angelaki, Dora - Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology, Washington University in St. Louis
Dickman, J. David - Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology, Washington University in St. Louis

Collections: Biology and Medicine