Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 13, 2025
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Methods to Explore the Influence of Top-down Visual Processes on Motor Behavior
Published on: April 16, 2014
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Visual processing of manipulable objects in the ventral stream is modulated by inputs from parietal action systems.
Frank E Garcea1,2,3, Emma L Strawderman1,2, William Burns2
1Department of Neuroscience, University of Rochester Medical Center, USA.
Biorxiv : the Preprint Server for Biology
|June 12, 2025
Summary
The left inferior parietal cortex influences how the brain processes manipulable objects by affecting neural activity in the ventral visual pathway. White matter pathways, specifically the arcuate fasciculus, are crucial for this object-related visual processing.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Cognitive Neuroscience
- Neuroimaging
Background:
- Functional object use integrates visual information from dorsal (action) and ventral (object properties) pathways.
- The precise interaction and white matter connections between these pathways for object processing remain incompletely understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the neural pathways and structural connectivity supporting the visual processing of manipulable objects.
- To determine if dorsal visual pathway regions influence ventral visual pathway processing of objects.
Main Methods:
- Voxel-based Lesion-Activity Mapping (VLAM) was used on functional MRI data from 109 neurosurgical patients with left-hemisphere lesions.
- Diffusion MRI was employed in a subset of participants (N=75) for connectome-wide analyses.
- Participants viewed images of manipulable objects, animals, faces, and places during fMRI scans.
Main Results:
- Lesions in the left inferior parietal cortex (anterior intraparietal sulcus, supramarginal gyrus) reduced neural responses to manipulable objects in the left fusiform gyrus.
- Parietal lesions did not impact the processing of places in the fusiform gyrus.
- White matter integrity in the left arcuate fasciculus correlated with object-specific neural responses in the fusiform gyrus, indicating its role in connecting parietal and temporal regions.
Conclusions:
- The dorsal visual pathway, specifically the left inferior parietal cortex, directly modulates ventral visual pathway responses for manipulable objects.
- Structural connectivity via the left arcuate fasciculus is essential for integrating action representations with object perception.
- This study elucidates the neural mechanisms underlying functional object use by demonstrating dorsal-ventral pathway interactions mediated by white matter tracts.
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