Study of tactile information representation in the visual cortex using neural decoding techniques

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26330172
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Cognitive science
• Research Institution: The University of Electro-Communications
• Principal Investigator: Miyawaki Yoichi 電気通信大学, 大学院情報理工学研究科, 教授 (80373372)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 脳・神経 / 認知科学 / 脳機能計測 / 機械学習 / クロスモーダル

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Previous studies suggest that the primary visual cortex can be activated by touching tactile stimuli while participants are closing their eyes. In this study, we investigated whether the activation in the primary visual cortex induced by tactile stimulation represents tactile stimulus information using neural decoding techniques. Results showed that the primary visual cortex was activated by tactile stimulation even for normal sighted participants but tactile stimulus prediction from the activity in the primary visual cortex was not statistically significant for all participants. These results suggest that the activity in the primary visual cortical evoked by tactile stimulation might not contain tactile stimulus information, at least with regard to types of tactile stimuli used in our experiments.

Free Research Field

神経科学