Notes: Summary The contribution of area 19 to pattern discrimination in the cat was studied by single cell recordings in this area and by behavioural experiments before and after bilateral lesions. In order to make quantitative comparisons between behavioural performance and that of cell systems, we introduced a new parameter that characterizes visual neurons by their signal-to-noise (S/N) thresholds. A structured visual background made up of Gaussian visual broadband noise which could be moved was superimposed on the signal (moving bars or outline patterns) and the S/N characteristics of the response were determined by varying the signal intensity. The detection performance of cats after bilateral lesion of area 19 showed no deficits. Only for slowly (11 deg/s) or quickly (110 deg/s) moving patterns, or when the background was moved relative to stationary patterns, did we find slight, but significant deficits in the low S/N range. However, when the S/N ratios were higher than 5, all cats achieved their full preoperative performances and no deficits remained. The S/N thresholds of neurons in area 19 were much higher than those found for neurons in areas 17 and 18. The lowest thresholds were found with a stationary background. Introduction of relative velocity between background and bar resulted in intermediate thresholds and the highest thresholds were observed for stimulus configurations lacking relative velocity. These effects correspond to the performance of the intact animal, in which introduction of relative motion increases the performance. The S/N thresholds did not correlate with levels of spike rate recorded at high S/N ratios, direction selectivity or speed preference, indicating that S/N threshold measurements provide a significant additional description of visual neurons. A limited number of area 19 cells recorded in area 17/18 lesioned animals showed very similar thresholds suggesting that this property may be independent of the intactness of areas 17 and 18. The residual performance by 17/18 lesioned cats in detecting small patterns corresponds well to the characteristics of the single cells of area 19. This suggests that area 19 might be able to make a considerable contribution to this task when areas 17/18 are eliminated, though by itself it seems not to be able to sustain the level of performance mediated by them. The contribution of area 19 is restricted to performances at high S/N ratios only. In contrast to what was found for areas 17 and 18, area 19 makes no essential contribution to lowering the S/N ratio at which the system is able to detect the presence of a pattern in a background of irrelevant detail.

Notes: Summary The ability of cats to discriminate between two geometrical outline patterns in the presence of superimposed Gaussian visual noise was tested before and after bilateral removal of cortical area 17 and parts of area 18. The detection probability PD was measured as a function of the signal-to-noise ratio for the parameters: noise bandwidth, spatial frequency content and rate of movement of patterns. In both normal and lesioned cats a broadband noise was found to be most effective in masking the large patterns while two other types of noise, a medium frequency noise and a high frequency noise had little or no masking effect. For recognition of the smaller patterns in normal cats the medium frequency noise was found to be more effective than the broadband noise. The performance of the lesional cats was disturbed severely at low signal-to-noise ratios and was significantly inferior to that of normal cats — especially for small patterns. However, at high S/N ratios and for large patterns the performance of the lesioned cats was comparable to that of normals while for the small patterns they reached PD values inferior to those of normal cats. It is concluded that although pattern recognition can be performed successfully by cats lacking areas 17 and 18, these cortical areas probably make an essential contribuion to this function under natural conditions in two ways: a) because of the X-type input of area 17, they increase the acuity of the system by making it more sensitive to higher spatial frequencies, and b) they permit detection of patterns at much lower S/N ratios i.e. they lower the signal-to-noise ratio at which the system is able to detect the presence of a pattern in a background of statistical visual noise. The latter effect is not limited to the higher spatial frequencies but also affects the very low spatial frequencies which are normally used for pattern detection. Previous failures to demonstrate clear deficits in pattern discrimination after 17/18 lesions in cats may be attributed to the fact that the patterns presented for discrimination were not masked by visual noise. Movement of patterns led to a slight, but not significant improvement of the performance in both normal and lesioned cats, but the deficits found for stationary and moving patterns were more or less equal.

Notes: Abstract The contribution of the lateral suprasylvian cortex to pattern recognition was studied by behavioural detection experiments in combination with bilateral lesions of different parts of the lateral suprasylvian areas (LSA) and area 7 in seven cats. In a two-alternatives forced choice task the cats had to discriminate simple outline patterns which were additively superimposed on a structured visual background made up of broadband Gaussian noise. For various stimulus conditions (moving or stationary patterns and/or background) the detection probability (P D) of the cats was measured as a function of the signal to noise ratio (S/N). Each cat was tested before and after the lesion. Four different types of lesion could be distinguished depending on their extent: (1) lesion of parts of the (LSA); (2) lesion of parts of the LSA with undercutting of areas 17, 18 and 19; (3) lesion of area 7; (4) lesion of area 7 and parts of the LSA. 1. We found that a large bilateral lesion of the LSA led to significant deficits in all test situations which were dependent on the existence of relative velocity of moving patterns against a structured background. The ability of the cats to discriminate simple outline patterns which were kept stationary was not reduced. On the contrary, when they were tested with stationary and moving patterns on unfocused (empty) backgrounds, we found, to our great surprise, that the performance of the lesioned cats was significantly improved compared with intact animals. As these lesioned cats had no deficits with moving patterns on a uniformly grey background, we conclude that the deficits with the moving patterns must have been caused by interactions between patterns and background, and not by movement of a pattern per se. 2. As soon as the lesion of the LSA was extended by a bilateral undercutting of areas 17, 18 and 19 we found very severe deficits in all test situations, regardless of whether the patterns were moving or kept stationary, or whether they were superimposed on a background or not. The most substantial deficits occurred when the patterns were moving on a stationary background. In these situations the cats were no longer able to reach the 84% correct criterion. Again, the cats were able to reach criterion with moving patterns on a uniformly grey background indicating that this deficit is probably caused by the interaction of patterns and background and not by motion of the patterns per se. 3. A large lesion of area 7 led to modest but significant deficits of more or less the same degree in all test situations with the exception of quickly moving patterns on a structured background. In contrast, a much smaller lesion of area 7 yielded significant deficits only when the background was moved and there was a low relative velocity between the patterns and the background. 4. In brief, the combination of a lesion of area 7 with that of the LSA roughly provoked a combination of the effects of the two lesions (1 and 3) alone. We found significant deficits in all test situations. We did not find evidence for any type of functional recovery in any of the lesions described. All deficits were permanent. Our results support the idea of a functional segregation between the LSA and area 7. They confirm that the LSA are involved in pattern recognition whenever it is associated with motion in combination with object-background interactions. This suggests an involvement of the LSA in the analysis of object- and self-induced motion. An interpretation of the results of lesioning area 7 is based on the conjecture that the mechanism of vergence movements or of binocular fusion of both retina images might be impaired. Under this condition it seems conceivable to expect double images or a reduced visual acuity because the images are out of focus. This would have a similar effect on the detection performance in each stimulus configuration. In addition, the results of lesion 4 provide evidence that both functional subunits (LSA and area 7) are not able to compensate for one another. Finally, we conclude from the results after lesion 2 that the LSA is part of a system which is based on the cooperation with striate cortex and requires intact primary cortex for its full function.

Notes: Summary The ability of two cats to discriminate between two geometrical outline patterns in the presence of superimposed Gaussian visual noise — i.e. in a binary detection task — was tested before and after bilateral removal of cortical areas 17, 18 and 19. The detection probability PD was measured as a function of the signal-to-noise ratio. After a lesion of areas 17, 18 and 19 both cats were unable to carry out the discrimination tasks. Their detection performance dropped to chance level, but after an extensive phase of retraining (3 months) they regained the ability to discriminate visual patterns. It was thus possible to obtain detection curves and to determine a measure of a performance which is predominantly bound to be mediated by extra-geniculo-cortical systems. The detection capacity was abnormally low with both large and small patterns. However, the detection of stationary small patterns was similar to the performance of cats with 17/18 lesions; the detection of stationary large patterns was only slightly better than the detection of small patterns and much worse than the comparable performance of cats with 17/18 lesions. Furthermore the cats with lesions of areas 17/18/19 were unable to discriminate moving patterns, their performances being at chance level, whereas for the cats with 17/18 lesions the detection of moving and stationary patterns was equal.