Abstract
Direction-selective visual neurones have been found in every mammalian visual system in which physiologists have searched for them. In the present article I will describe experiments that have revealed quite different motion processing mechanisms in two of the studied species, the rabbit and the wallaby, Macropus eugenii. Vaney et al. (this volume) review the current state of knowledge on direction-selective (DS) mechanisms in the rabbit retina. Here I will briefly recapitulate the proposed mechanisms that lead to DS responses in rabbit On-Off DS retinal ganglion cells, with specific reference to the non-linear interaction that is integral to the DS mechanism. The data from the rabbit retina will then be compared to results from horizontally tuned DS neurones in the nucleus of the optic tract (NOT) of the wallaby (e.g. Ibbotson et al. 1994, 1998, 1999). This comparison is interesting because it has been suggested that On-Off DS retinal ganglion cells form part of the input to the NOT in the rabbit (Oyster et al. 1972). If similar motion processing strategies are used in both the rabbit and wallaby retinas, it might be expected that evidence for the same DS mechanisms that are found in the rabbit On-Off DS neurones should be revealed in at least some of the wallaby NOT neurones (Ibbotson et al. 1994). As will be described, this is not the case, possibly indicating species-specific processing strategies.
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© 2001 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Ibbotson, M. (2001). Identification of Mechanisms Underlying Motion Detection in Mammals. In: Zanker, J.M., Zeil, J. (eds) Motion Vision. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-56550-2_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-56550-2_3
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