Specific somatic sensory relays in the mammalian diencephalon

There are five major domains within the diencephalon that receive input from ascending somatic sensory pathways serving the limbs, trunk and viscera. These domains include the ventroposterolateral nucleus (VPL), the posterior group complex (PO), the zona incerta (ZI), the intralaminar complex and the thalamic reticular nucleus. Of these five domains, VPL is commonly considered a "specific" somatic "relay". The reasons for this view are that VPL receives dense, synaptically secure and precisely organized input from the equally precisely organized dorsal column nuclei (DCN), that most of VPL's neurons have small, unimodal cutaneous receptive fields which reflect their input from DCN, and that these neurons project this information in a precise way to the somatic sensory cortex. Several lines of evidence suggest that this rather simple view of VPL be modified. First, not only does VPL receive complex patterns of partially converging input from other ascending somatic pathways besides the DCN, but the pattern of its input from DCN appears to be more complex than once thought. Second, such input convergence and complex connective patterns also occur within PO and ZI (although the characteristics of the patterns differ between the three domains). Third, the response properties of neurons within VPL differ in its different parts and are not necessarily precise mirrors of the response properties of neurons within DCN. Fourth, although the responses of neurons in PO on the whole differ from those in VPL, there are some similarities. The same conclusion may prove true for neurons in the DCN-recipient portion of ZI.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)