A simple mechanism to reproduce the neural solution of the aperture problem in monkey area MT

Maria-Jose Escobar (1) , Guillaume S. Masson (2) , Pierre Kornprobst (1)

1 ODYSSEE - Computer and biological vision
2 INCM - Institut de neurosciences cognitives de la méditerranée - UMR 6193

We propose a simple mechanism to reproduce the neural solution of the aperture problem in monkey area MT. More precisely, our goal is to propose a model able to reproduce the dynamical change of the preferred direction (PD) of a MT cell depending on the motion information contained in the input stimulus. The PD of a MT cell measured through drifting gratings differs of the one measured using a barberpole, which is highly related with its aspect ratio. For a barberpole, the PD evolves from the perpendicular direction of the drifting grating to a PD shifted according to the aspect ratio of the barberpole. The mechanisms underlying this dynamic are unknown (lateral connections, surround suppression, feed-backs from higher layers). Here, we show that a simple mechanism such as surround-inhibition in V1 neurons can produce a significant shift in the PD of MT neurons as observed with barberpoles of different aspect ratios.

Mots clés: Movement; Neuronal models; Vision

Domaines: Neurosciences [q-bio.NC]; Neurosciences

Maria-Jose Escobar, Guillaume S. Masson, Pierre Kornprobst. A simple mechanism to reproduce the neural solution of the aperture problem in monkey area MT. Deuxième conférence française de Neurosciences Computationnelles, "Neurocomp08", Oct 2008, Marseille, France. ⟨hal-00331582⟩