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Kaduk K, Wilke M, Kagan I. Dorsal pulvinar inactivation leads to spatial selection bias without perceptual deficit. Sci Rep 2024; 14:12852. [PMID: 38834578 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-62056-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/02/2023] [Accepted: 05/13/2024] [Indexed: 06/06/2024] Open
Abstract
The dorsal pulvinar has been implicated in visuospatial attentional and perceptual confidence processing. Pulvinar lesions in humans and monkeys lead to spatial neglect symptoms, including an overt spatial saccade bias during free choices. However, it remains unclear whether disrupting the dorsal pulvinar during target selection that relies on a perceptual decision leads to a perceptual impairment or a more general spatial orienting and choice deficit. To address this question, we reversibly inactivated the unilateral dorsal pulvinar by injecting GABA-A agonist THIP while two macaque monkeys performed a color discrimination saccade task with varying perceptual difficulty. We used Signal Detection Theory and simulations to dissociate perceptual sensitivity (d-prime) and spatial selection bias (response criterion) effects. We expected a decrease in d-prime if dorsal pulvinar affects perceptual discrimination and a shift in response criterion if dorsal pulvinar is mainly involved in spatial orienting. After the inactivation, we observed response criterion shifts away from contralesional stimuli, especially when two competing stimuli in opposite hemifields were present. Notably, the d-prime and overall accuracy remained largely unaffected. Our results underline the critical contribution of the dorsal pulvinar to spatial orienting and action selection while showing it to be less important for visual perceptual discrimination.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kristin Kaduk
- Decision and Awareness Group, Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, German Primate Center, Leibniz Institute for Primate Research, Kellnerweg 4, 37077, Göttingen, Germany
- Department of Cognitive Neurology, University of Goettingen, Robert-Koch-Str. 40, 37075, Göttingen, Germany
- Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Tübingen Center for Mental Health, University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
| | - Melanie Wilke
- Decision and Awareness Group, Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, German Primate Center, Leibniz Institute for Primate Research, Kellnerweg 4, 37077, Göttingen, Germany
- Department of Cognitive Neurology, University of Goettingen, Robert-Koch-Str. 40, 37075, Göttingen, Germany
- Cognitive Neurology Group, Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, German Primate Center, Leibniz Institute for Primate Research, Kellnerweg 4, 37077, Göttingen, Germany
- Leibniz ScienceCampus Primate Cognition, Kellnerweg 4, 37077, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Igor Kagan
- Decision and Awareness Group, Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, German Primate Center, Leibniz Institute for Primate Research, Kellnerweg 4, 37077, Göttingen, Germany.
- Department of Cognitive Neurology, University of Goettingen, Robert-Koch-Str. 40, 37075, Göttingen, Germany.
- Leibniz ScienceCampus Primate Cognition, Kellnerweg 4, 37077, Göttingen, Germany.
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Goodspeed K, Horton D, Lowden A, Sguigna PV, Booth T, Wang ZJ, Edgar VB. A cross-sectional natural history study of aspartylglucosaminuria. JIMD Rep 2022; 63:425-433. [PMID: 36101820 PMCID: PMC9458605 DOI: 10.1002/jmd2.12294] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/21/2022] [Revised: 04/22/2022] [Accepted: 05/02/2022] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
Aspartylglucosaminuria (AGU) is a rare lysosomal storage disorder that causes stagnation of development in adolescence and neurodegeneration in early adulthood. Precision therapies, including gene transfer therapy, are in development with a goal of taking advantage of the slow clinical course. Understanding of disease natural history and identification of disease-relevant biomarkers are important steps in clinical trial readiness. We describe the clinical features of a diverse population of patients with AGU, including potential imaging and electrophysiological biomarkers. This is a single-center, cross-sectional study of the clinical, neuropsychological, electrophysiological, and imaging characteristics of AGU. A comprehensive assessment of eight participants (5 Non-Finnish) revealed a mean non-verbal IQ (NVIQ) of 70.25 ± 10.33 which decreased with age (rs = -0.85, p = 0.008). All participants demonstrated deficits in communication and gross/fine motor dysfunction. Auditory and visual evoked potentials demonstrated abnormalities in one or both modalities in 7 of 8 subjects, suggesting sensory pathway dysfunction. Brain imaging demonstrated T2 FLAIR hypointensity in the pulvinar nuclei and cerebral atrophy, as previously shown in the Finnish AGU population. Magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) showed a 5.1 ppm peak corresponding to the toxic substrate (GlcNAc-Asn), which accumulates in AGU. Our results showed there was no significant difference between Finnish and Non-Finnish patients, and performance on standardized cognitive and motor testing was similar to prior studies. Age-related changes on functional assessments and disease-relevant abnormalities on surrogate biomarkers, such as MRS, could be used as outcome measures in a clinical trial.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kimberly Goodspeed
- Department of PediatricsUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA,Children's Health DallasDallasTexasUSA,Department of NeurologyUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA,Department of PsychiatryUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA
| | - Daniel Horton
- Children's Health DallasDallasTexasUSA,Department of PsychiatryUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA
| | - Andrea Lowden
- Department of PediatricsUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA,Children's Health DallasDallasTexasUSA,Department of NeurologyUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA
| | - Peter V. Sguigna
- Department of NeurologyUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA
| | - Timothy Booth
- Children's Health DallasDallasTexasUSA,Department of RadiologyUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA
| | - Zhiyue J. Wang
- Children's Health DallasDallasTexasUSA,Department of RadiologyUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA
| | - Veronica Bordes Edgar
- Department of PediatricsUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA,Children's Health DallasDallasTexasUSA,Department of PsychiatryUniversity of Texas Southwestern Medical CenterDallasTexasUSA
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Abstract
Initial evaluation structures (IESs) currently proposed as the earliest detectors of affective stimuli (e.g., amygdala, orbitofrontal cortex, or insula) are high-order structures (a) whose response latency cannot account for the first visual cortex emotion-related response (~80 ms), and (b) lack the necessary infrastructure to locally analyze the visual features that define emotional stimuli. Several thalamic structures accomplish both criteria. The lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN), a first-order thalamic nucleus that actively processes visual information, with the complement of the thalamic reticular nucleus (TRN) are proposed as core IESs. This LGN–TRN tandem could be supported by the pulvinar, a second-order thalamic structure, and by other extrathalamic nuclei. The visual thalamus, scarcely explored in affective neurosciences, seems crucial in early emotional evaluation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Luis Carretié
- Facultad de Psicología, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain
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Guedj C, Vuilleumier P. Functional connectivity fingerprints of the human pulvinar: Decoding its role in cognition. Neuroimage 2020; 221:117162. [PMID: 32659353 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.117162] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/06/2020] [Revised: 06/10/2020] [Accepted: 07/08/2020] [Indexed: 01/17/2023] Open
Abstract
The pulvinar is the largest thalamic nucleus in the brain and considered as a key structure in sensory processing and attention. Although its anatomy is well known, in particular thanks to studies in non-human primates, its role in perception and cognition remains poorly understood. Here, we used resting-state functional connectivity from a large sample of high-resolution data provided by the Human Connectome Project, combined with a large-scale meta-analysis approach to segregate and characterize the functional organization of the pulvinar nucleus. We identified five clusters per pulvinar with distinct connectivity profiles and determined their respective co-activation patterns. Using the Neurosynth database, we then investigated the functional significance of these co-activation networks. Our results confirm the functional heterogeneity of the pulvinar, revealing clearcut differences across clusters in terms of their connectivity patterns and associated cognitive domains. While the anterior and lateral clusters appear to be involved in action and attention domains, the ventromedial and dorsomedial clusters may preferentially subserve emotional processes and saliency detection. In contrast, the inferior cluster shows less specificity but correlates with perception and memory processes. Collectively, our results suggest that the pulvinar underwrites different components of cognition, supporting a central role in the coordination of cortico-subcortical processes mediated by distributed brain networks.
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Affiliation(s)
- Carole Guedj
- Neuroscience Department, Laboratory for Behavioral Neurology and Imaging of Cognition, University Medical School of Geneva, Campus BIOTECH H8, 9 Chemin des Mines, 1202, Geneva, Switzerland.
| | - Patrik Vuilleumier
- Neuroscience Department, Laboratory for Behavioral Neurology and Imaging of Cognition, University Medical School of Geneva, Campus BIOTECH H8, 9 Chemin des Mines, 1202, Geneva, Switzerland
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