TACTILE PROCESSING DEPENDS ON MOTOR INTENTIONS
Embargo until
2020-08-01
Date
2019-06-06
Authors
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Publisher
Johns Hopkins University
Abstract
Tactile processing serves upcoming actions, which depend on behavioral goals. It remains unclear how neural signals related to movements interact with sensory signals in primary somatosensory (S1) cortex. We developed a cross-modal attention task in which head-fixed mice flexibly switched between responding to tactile stimuli in the presence of visual distractors, or to visual stimuli in the presence of tactile distractors, using licking movements to the left or right side in different blocks of trials. Spiking of S1 neurons during the task showed both tactile and licking-related motor responses. S1 neurons encoded tactile stimuli, licking, and direction of licking in response to tactile but not visual stimuli. Optogenetic stimulation of tongue premotor cortex recapitulated motor signals in S1. Bidirectional optogenetic manipulations revealed that performance depended on sensory-motor activity in S1 during attention to touch but not vision. Our results show that sensory and motor signals interact in S1 to promote specific actions.
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Keywords
Sensorimotor processing, pre-motor theory of attention, action schemas, primary somatosensory cortex, barrel cortex, anterior lateral motor cortex.