Modification induced in visual cortical activity of rat by neonatal monocular enucleation

Monocular enucleation was performed on rats at birth. The animals were raised and from the age of 3 months the evoked activity was tested in the contralateral visual cortex both by mapping of evoked potentials and by autoradiography. It was found that monocular enucleation changed the distribution of the evoked activity characteristically. The focus of activity shifted laterally and was restricted to the binocular part of the primary visual cortex, while hardly any evoked activity or labelled neurons were found in its medial part.