Evaluating the correspondence between face-, scene-, and object-selectivity and retinotopic organization within...

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Visual Perception
• Brain Mapping

Background:

• Human lateral occipitotemporal cortex (lOTC) organization is understood through retinotopy and category-selectivity.
• Previous research suggested distinct locations for these principles, but recent findings indicate overlap.
• Understanding the interplay between retinotopic maps and category-selective regions is crucial for mapping brain function.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate and contrast the retinotopic profiles of scene-selective (occipital place area, OPA), face-selective (occipital face area, OFA), and object-selective (lateral occipital cortex, LO) regions within the lOTC.
• To examine the relationship between category-selective areas and underlying retinotopic maps.
• To determine if category-selective regions inherit retinotopic characteristics.

Main Methods:

• Combined detailed mapping of retinotopy using population receptive fields (pRF) with category-selectivity mapping.
• Analyzed the overlap between OPA, OFA, and LO with established retinotopic maps (V3A, V3B, LO1, LO2).
• Assessed the retinotopic bias of voxels within these selective regions.

Main Results:

• Striking differences observed in the retinotopic profiles of OPA, OFA, and LO.
• OPA overlapped multiple retinotopic maps (V3A, V3B, LO1, LO2); LO overlapped two maps (LO1, LO2); OFA overlapped minimal retinotopic maps.
• All three regions showed a bias towards the contralateral lower visual field, suggesting inherited retinotopic characteristics.

Conclusions:

• Category-selective regions are not consistently constrained by retinotopic map borders.
• The extensive overlap in OPA suggests it may not be a single scene-selective region, while OFA's lack of overlap suggests a more uniform area.
• Category-selective regions likely inherit retinotopic characteristics from the maps providing their visual information.