Relating Scene Memory and Perception Activity to Functional Properties, Networks, and Landmarks of Posterior Cerebral...

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Cognitive Neuroscience
• Neuroimaging

Background:

• Adaptive behavior relies on integrating visual perception with spatial memory.
• Previous studies suggested posterior cerebral cortex areas, specifically place memory areas (PMAs) anterior to visual scene perception areas (SPAs), are involved.
• The precise anatomical and hierarchical position of PMAs remained unclear.

Purpose of the Study:

• To precisely characterize the anatomical location of PMAs relative to SPAs.
• To determine the position of PMAs within the broader cortical hierarchy.
• To provide probabilistic parcels of these regions for future research.

Main Methods:

• Utilized three functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) datasets (44 participants).
• Identified SPAs using a visual localizer task (scenes vs. faces).
• Identified PMAs by contrasting brain activity during recall of familiar places versus familiar faces or multiple categories.

Main Results:

• PMAs were consistently located anterior to SPAs on ventral and lateral cortical surfaces across datasets.
• PMAs were situated at the boundary between externally oriented (dorsal attention) and internally oriented (default mode) networks.
• PMAs were located anterior to mapped visual cortex, distinct from retinotopic maps of SPAs.

Conclusions:

• Established the anatomical position of PMAs at key inflection points in the cortical hierarchy.
• Informs theories on how the brain integrates visual perception and spatial memory for scene understanding.
• Released probabilistic parcels to aid future research on PMAs in spatial cognition.