Paucity of chromatic linear motion detectors in macaque V1

The motion of a color-defined edge is often more difficult to perceive than the motion of a luminance-defined edge. Neurons subserving motion vision may therefore be particularly sensitive to luminance contrast. One class of neurons thought to play a critical role in motion perception is V1 neurons whose spatiotemporal receptive fields are oriented in space-time. We used the reverse correlation technique to study the relationship between color tuning and space-time receptive field orientation in V1 neurons of awake, fixating monkeys. Neurons with space-time oriented receptive fields were tuned almost exclusively for luminance, whereas neurons with nonoriented space-time receptive fields were tuned for luminance or for color. These results suggest that the special role of luminance contrast in motion perception is due in part to the establishment of space-time oriented receptive fields among luminance-tuned, but not color-tuned, V1 neurons.