Detecting biological motion signals in human and monkey superior colliculus: a subcortical-cortical pathway for biological motion perception

Xiqian Lu, Zhaoqi Hu, Yumeng Xin, Tianshu Yang, Ying Wang, Peng Zhang, Ning Liu () and Yi Jiang ()
Additional contact information
Xiqian Lu: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Zhaoqi Hu: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Yumeng Xin: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Tianshu Yang: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Ying Wang: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Peng Zhang: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Ning Liu: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Yi Jiang: Chinese Academy of Sciences

Nature Communications, 2024, vol. 15, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract Most vertebrates, including humans, are highly adept at detecting and encoding biological motion, even when it is portrayed by just a few point lights attached to the head and major joints. However, the function of subcortical regions in biological motion perception has been scarcely explored. Here, we investigate the role of the superior colliculus in local biological motion processing. Using high-field (3 T) and ultra-high-field (7 T) functional magnetic resonance imaging, we record the neural responses of the superior colliculus to scrambled point-light walkers (with local kinematics retained) in both humans and male macaque monkeys. Results show that the superior colliculus, especially the superficial layers, selectively responds to local biological motion. Furthermore, dynamic causal modeling analysis reveals a subcortical-cortical functional pathway that transmits local biological motion signals from the superior colliculus via the middle temporal visual complex to the posterior superior temporal sulcus in the human brain. These findings suggest the existence of a cross-species mechanism in the superior colliculus that facilitates the detection of local biological motion at the early stage of the visual processing stream.

Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-53968-x Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:15:y:2024:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-024-53968-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-53968-x

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().