A MATLAB-based eye tracking control system using non-invasive helmet head restraint in the macaque

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Cognitive Science
• Systems Neuroscience

Background:

• Eye tracking is crucial for behavioral and neurophysiological studies.
• Infrared cameras offer non-invasive eye tracking, unlike older magnetic search coil methods.
• Traditional systems often require rigid head fixation for precise eye tracking in monkeys.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate non-rigid head fixation for eye tracking.
• To present a MATLAB software solution for data acquisition and analysis.
• To demonstrate a flexible approach to eye tracking in neuroscience.

Main Methods:

• Utilized a helmet for non-rigid head fixation, allowing some head movement.
• Developed a MATLAB software for gathering and processing eye position data.
• Implemented data streaming for superior timing performance compared to data storage.

Main Results:

• Demonstrated adequate performance on a fixation paradigm with two monkeys.
• Showed how performance is influenced by parameters like fixation window size.
• Validated the effectiveness of non-rigid head restraint for behavioral training and testing.

Conclusions:

• Non-rigid head restraint is viable for gaze-dependent visual paradigms.
• The developed software achieves excellent timing performance through data streaming.
• The system is applicable to human eye tracking where head constraint is not desired.