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Cited by 890Visual perception and processing mechanismsNeuroscience and Neuropharmacology ResearchNeural dynamics and brain function

Spatial summation in the receptive fields of simple cells in the cat's striate cortex.

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Movshon, J A, Thompson, I D, Tolhurst, D J·1978·The Journal of Physiology
DOI 10.1113/jphysiol.1978.sp012488PMC PMC1282765
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Abstract

1. We have examined the responses of simple cells in the cat's atriate cortex to visual patterns that were designed to reveal the extent to which these cells may be considered to sum light-evoked influences linearly across their receptive fields. We used one-dimensional luminance-modulated bars and grating as stimuli; their orientation was always the same as the preferred orientation of the neurone under study. The stimuli were presented on an oscilloscope screen by a digital computer, which also accumulated neuronal responses and controlled a randomized sequence of stimulus presentations. 2. The majority of simple cells respond to sinusoidal gratings that are moving or whose contrast is modulated in time in a manner consistent with the hypothesis that they have linear spatial summation. Their responses to moving gratings of all spatial frequencies are modulated in synchrony with the passage of the gratings' bars across their receptive fields, and they do not produce unmodulated responses even at the highest spatial frequencies. Many of these cells respond to temporally modulated stationary gratings simply by changing their response amplitude sinusoidally as the spatial phase of the grating the grating is varied. Nonetheless, their behavior appears to indicate linear spatial summation, since we show in an Appendix that the absence of a 'null' phase in a visual neurone need not indicate non-linear spatial summation, and further that a linear neurone lacking a 'null' phase should give responses of the form that we have observed in this type of simple cell. 3. A minority of simple cells appears to have significant non-linearities of spatial summation. These neurones respond to moving gratings of high spatial frequency with a partially or totally unmodulated elevation of firing rate. They have no 'null' phases when tested with stationary gratings, and reveal their non-linearity by giving responses to gratings of some spatial phases that are composed partly or wholly of even harmonics of the stimulus frequency ('on-off' responses). 4. We compared simple receptive fields with their sensitivity to sinusoidal gratings of different spatial frequencies. Qualitatively, the most sensitive subregions of simple cells' receptive fields are roughly the same width as the individual bars of the gratings to which they are most sensitive. Quantitatively, their receptive field profiles measured with thin stationary lines, agree well with predicted profiles derived by Fourier synthesis of their spatial frequency tuning curves.

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  • Neurons in the visual cortex and extra-striate cortex are spatial frequency and orientation selective, and simple cells in the visual cortex act more or less as linear filters.

    “Neurons in the visual cortex and the extra-striate cortex are spatial frequency and orientation selective and simple cells in the visual cortex are known to act more or less as linear filters [51], [52], [53].”

    From Motion Tuned Spatio-Temporal Quality Assessment of Natural Videos (2010) · cites this paper as [51]

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Authors
Movshon, J. A., Thompson, I. D., & Tolhurst, D. J.
ORCID
Venue
The Journal of Physiology
Publisher
Wiley
Published
1978-10
Volume
283
Issue
1
Pages
53-77
ISSN
  • 0022-3751 (ISSN-L)
  • 1469-7793
DOI
10.1113/jphysiol.1978.sp012488
PMC
PMC1282765
OpenAlex
W2022491393
Cited by
890
References
3
Citations by year
2026: 8 · 2025: 14 · 2024: 18 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 14 · 2021: 13 · 2020: 11 · 2019: 15 · 2018: 15 · 2017: 14 · 2016: 22 · 2015: 27 · 2014: 22 · 2013: 22 · 2012: 24
FWCI
11.63
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor (vor)
Locations
  • The Journal of Physiology (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Visual perception and processing mechanisms
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neuroscience and Neuropharmacology Research
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural dynamics and brain function
Keywords
simple cells, primary visual cortex, spatial summation, receptive fields, linear summation, sinusoidal gratings, moving gratings, spatial frequency tuning, phase sensitivity, cat visual system, ON and OFF responses, even harmonics
MeSH terms
Action Potentials, Animals, Cats, Motion Perception, Neurons, Photic Stimulation, Visual Cortex, Visual Perception

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