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Sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex

Sensory eye dominance occurs when the visual cortex weighs one eye’s data more heavily than those of the other. Encouragingly, mechanisms underlying sensory eye dominance in human adults retain a certain degree of plasticity. Notably, perceptual training using dichoptically presented motion signal-n...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Kam, Ka Yee, Chang, Dorita H. F.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10513037/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37746154
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2023.1250493
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author Kam, Ka Yee
Chang, Dorita H. F.
author_facet Kam, Ka Yee
Chang, Dorita H. F.
author_sort Kam, Ka Yee
collection PubMed
description Sensory eye dominance occurs when the visual cortex weighs one eye’s data more heavily than those of the other. Encouragingly, mechanisms underlying sensory eye dominance in human adults retain a certain degree of plasticity. Notably, perceptual training using dichoptically presented motion signal-noise stimuli has been shown to elicit changes in sensory eye dominance both in visually impaired and normal observers. However, the neural mechanisms underlying these learning-driven improvements are not well understood. Here, we measured changes in fMRI responses before and after a five-day visual training protocol to determine the neuroplastic changes along the visual cascade. Fifty visually normal observers received training on a dichoptic or binocular variant of a signal-in-noise (left–right) motion discrimination task over five consecutive days. We show significant shifts in sensory eye dominance following training, but only for those who received dichoptic training. Pattern analysis of fMRI responses revealed that responses of V1 and hMT+ predicted sensory eye dominance for both groups, but only before training. After dichoptic (but not binocular) visual training, responses of V1 changed significantly, and were no longer able to predict sensory eye dominance. Our data suggest that perceptual training-driven changes in eye dominance are driven by a reweighting of the two eyes’ data in the primary visual cortex. These findings may provide insight into developing region-targeted rehabilitative paradigms for the visually impaired, particularly those with severe binocular imbalance.
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spelling pubmed-105130372023-09-22 Sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex Kam, Ka Yee Chang, Dorita H. F. Front Neurosci Neuroscience Sensory eye dominance occurs when the visual cortex weighs one eye’s data more heavily than those of the other. Encouragingly, mechanisms underlying sensory eye dominance in human adults retain a certain degree of plasticity. Notably, perceptual training using dichoptically presented motion signal-noise stimuli has been shown to elicit changes in sensory eye dominance both in visually impaired and normal observers. However, the neural mechanisms underlying these learning-driven improvements are not well understood. Here, we measured changes in fMRI responses before and after a five-day visual training protocol to determine the neuroplastic changes along the visual cascade. Fifty visually normal observers received training on a dichoptic or binocular variant of a signal-in-noise (left–right) motion discrimination task over five consecutive days. We show significant shifts in sensory eye dominance following training, but only for those who received dichoptic training. Pattern analysis of fMRI responses revealed that responses of V1 and hMT+ predicted sensory eye dominance for both groups, but only before training. After dichoptic (but not binocular) visual training, responses of V1 changed significantly, and were no longer able to predict sensory eye dominance. Our data suggest that perceptual training-driven changes in eye dominance are driven by a reweighting of the two eyes’ data in the primary visual cortex. These findings may provide insight into developing region-targeted rehabilitative paradigms for the visually impaired, particularly those with severe binocular imbalance. Frontiers Media S.A. 2023-08-31 /pmc/articles/PMC10513037/ /pubmed/37746154 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2023.1250493 Text en Copyright © 2023 Kam and Chang. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Neuroscience
Kam, Ka Yee
Chang, Dorita H. F.
Sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex
title Sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex
title_full Sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex
title_fullStr Sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex
title_full_unstemmed Sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex
title_short Sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex
title_sort sensory eye dominance plasticity in the human adult visual cortex
topic Neuroscience
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10513037/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37746154
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2023.1250493
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