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EXPERIMENT |
| Rosa, Marcello G. P., et. al. 1997. Visual Field Representation in Striate and Prestriate Cortices of a Prosimian Primate (Galago garnetti). Journal of Neurophysiology 77 (6): 3193-3217. |
| PURPOSE | As was mentioned in the VISUAL CORTEX page, a study of the vastly simpler prosimian brain (compared to other primates) can lead to an easier understanding of our own visual complexities. The primary purpose of this experiment was to "descripe the representation of the visual field" of the Galago garnetti. |
| PROCEDURE | To obtain this data, Rosa and his colleagues anesthetized these prosimians and placed microelectrodes in their eyes. By doing this, they could map the neural images as the eye responded to stimuli. |
| RESULTS | These scientists were able to accurately map the visual
cortex in the prosimian Galago garnetti. Enormous amounts
of data were obtained through this process.
A visual field "topography" was mapped, a sample of which is shown below. The figures on the left below (A and B) show the visuotopic organization and extent of the V1 cortex. In figure C, we the projection of the receptive fields of the animals used, which represents the visual field these animals have. On the right, we see a reconstructed shape of the visual area of the prosimian. |
 courtesy Rosa, et al. |
 courtesy Rosa, et al. |
     
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