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: 94/2/1252    most recent 00949.2004v1 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 (15) Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by De Souza, W. C. Articles by Ono, T. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by De Souza, W. C. Articles by Ono, T.

Differential Characteristics of Face Neuron Responses Within the Anterior Superior Temporal Sulcus of Macaques

Department of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine, Toyama Medical and Pharmaceutical University, Toyama, Japan

Submitted 13 September 2004; accepted in final form 27 March 2005

The anterior superior temporal sulcus (STS) of macaque monkeys is thought to be involved in the analysis of incoming perceptual information for face recognition or identification; face neurons in the anterior STS show tuning to facial views and/or gaze direction in the faces of others. Although it is well known that both the anatomical architecture and the connectivity differ between the rostral and caudal regions of the anterior STS, the functional heterogeneity of these regions is not well understood. We recorded the activity of face neurons in the anterior STS of macaque monkeys during the performance of a face identification task, and we compared the characteristics of face neuron responses in the caudal and rostral regions of the anterior STS. In the caudal region, facial views that elicited optimal responses were distributed among all views tested; the majority of face neurons responded symmetrically to right and left views. In contrast, the face neurons in the rostral region responded optimally to a single oblique view; right-left symmetry among the responses of these neurons was less evident. Modulation of the face neuron responses according to gaze direction was more evident in the rostral region. Some of the face neuron responses were specific to a certain combination of a particular facial view and a particular gaze direction, whereas others were associated with the relative spatial relationship between facial view and gaze direction. Taken together, these results indicated the existence of a functional heterogeneity within the anterior STS and suggested a plausible hierarchical organization of facial information processing.

This article has been cited by other articles:

				S. V. Shepherd, J. T. Klein, R. O. Deaner, and M. L. Platt Mirroring of attention by neurons in macaque parietal cortex PNAS, June 9, 2009; 106(23): 9489 - 9494. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				D. Y. Tsao, S. Moeller, and W. A. Freiwald Comparing face patch systems in macaques and humans PNAS, December 9, 2008; 105(49): 19514 - 19519. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				F. Fang, S. O. Murray, and S. He Duration-Dependent fMRI Adaptation and Distributed Viewer-Centered Face Representation in Human Visual Cortex Cereb Cortex, June 1, 2007; 17(6): 1402 - 1411. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]