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Lookup NU author(s): Professor Christopher Petkov, Dr Yuki Kikuchi, Alice Milne
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
It is generally held that non-primary sensory regions of the brain have a strong impact on frontal cortex. However, the effective connectivity of pathways to frontal cortex is poorly understood. Here we microstimulate sites in the superior temporal and ventral frontal cortex of monkeys and use functional magnetic resonance imaging to evaluate the functional activity resulting from the stimulation of interconnected regions. Surprisingly, we find that, although certain earlier stages of auditory cortical processing can strongly activate frontal cortex, downstream auditory regions, such as voice-sensitive cortex, appear to functionally engage primarily an ipsilateral temporal lobe network. Stimulating other sites within this activated temporal lobe network shows strong activation of frontal cortex. The results indicate that the relative stage of sensory processing does not predict the level of functional access to the frontal lobes. Rather, certain brain regions engage local networks, only parts of which have a strong functional impact on frontal cortex.
Author(s): Petkov CI, Kikuchi Y, Milne AE, Mishkin M, Rauschecker JP, Logothetis NK
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Nature Communications
Year: 2015
Volume: 6
Print publication date: 01/01/2015
Online publication date: 23/01/2015
Acceptance date: 28/11/2014
Date deposited: 29/06/2015
ISSN (electronic): 2041-1723
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ncomms7000
DOI: 10.1038/ncomms7000
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