Purkinje Cell Activity And Saccadic Adaptation

Robijanto Soetedjo and Albert F. Fuchs

Saccades begin as commands from the cortex and converge on motor neurons under orders from the superior colliculus via the brainstem and cerebellum. These pathways adapt over a lifetime to maintain accurate saccades. This week, Soetedjo and Fuchs asked where those adaptations occur. The authors trained monkeys to focus on jumping targets and evoked adjustments by moving the targets during horizontal saccades. They recorded from Purkinje neurons in the oculomotor vermis, cells that are thought to control saccade amplitude and participate in adaptation. In 21 of the 27 neurons hey recorded, the authors were able to determine a direction preference based on the complex spiking (CS) activity of each neuron. CS activity during adaptation did not reflect the magnitude of the error, but it did reflect the error direction. Errors in the on-direction that required backward adaptation produced greater changes in CS activity than did control saccades or forward adaptation errors.

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Purkinje Cell Activity And Saccadic Adaptation