HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS		QUICK SEARCH:   [advanced] Author: Keyword(s): Year:  Vol:  Page:

This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) All Versions of this Article: 96/3/1602    most recent 00023.2006v1 Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in Web of Science Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Web of Science (18) Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Karmeier, K. Articles by Egelhaaf, M. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Karmeier, K. Articles by Egelhaaf, M.

Encoding of Naturalistic Optic Flow by a Population of Blowfly Motion-Sensitive Neurons

¹Department of Neurobiology, Faculty for Biology, Bielefeld University; Bielefeld, Germany; and ²Department of Neurobiophysics, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands

Submitted 10 January 2006; accepted in final form 28 April 2006

In sensory systems information is encoded by the activity of populations of neurons. To analyze the coding properties of neuronal populations sensory stimuli have usually been used that were much simpler than those encountered in real life. It has been possible only recently to stimulate visual interneurons of the blowfly with naturalistic visual stimuli reconstructed from eye movements measured during free flight. Therefore we now investigate with naturalistic optic flow the coding properties of a small neuronal population of identified visual interneurons in the blowfly, the so-called VS and HS neurons. These neurons are motion sensitive and directionally selective and are assumed to extract information about the animal's self-motion from optic flow. We could show that neuronal responses of VS and HS neurons are mainly shaped by the characteristic dynamical properties of the fly's saccadic flight and gaze strategy. Individual neurons encode information about both the rotational and the translational components of the animal's self-motion. Thus the information carried by individual neurons is ambiguous. The ambiguities can be reduced by considering neuronal population activity. The joint responses of different subpopulations of VS and HS neurons can provide unambiguous information about the three rotational and the three translational components of the animal's self-motion and also, indirectly, about the three-dimensional layout of the environment.

This article has been cited by other articles:

				S. N. Fry, N. Rohrseitz, A. D. Straw, and M. H. Dickinson Visual control of flight speed in Drosophila melanogaster J. Exp. Biol., April 15, 2009; 212(8): 1120 - 1130. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				R. Rosner, M. Egelhaaf, J. Grewe, and A. K. Warzecha Variability of blowfly head optomotor responses J. Exp. Biol., April 15, 2009; 212(8): 1170 - 1184. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				P. Liang, R. Kern, and M. Egelhaaf Motion Adaptation Enhances Object-Induced Neural Activity in Three-Dimensional Virtual Environment J. Neurosci., October 29, 2008; 28(44): 11328 - 11332. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				H. Cuntz, J. Haag, F. Forstner, I. Segev, and A. Borst Robust coding of flow-field parameters by axo-axonal gap junctions between fly visual interneurons PNAS, June 12, 2007; 104(24): 10229 - 10233. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				J. Grewe, N. Matos, M. Egelhaaf, and A.-K. Warzecha Implications of Functionally Different Synaptic Inputs for Neuronal Gain and Computational Properties of Fly Visual Interneurons J Neurophysiol, October 1, 2006; 96(4): 1838 - 1847. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]