Brain-stem influence on visual response of lagged and nonlagged cells in the cat lateral geniculate nucleus

This study examined the influence of the pontomesencephalic peribrachial region (PBR) on the visual response properties of cells in the dorsal lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN). The response of single cells to a stationary flashing light spot was recorded with accompanying electrical stimulation of the PBR. The major objectives were to compare the effects of PBR stimulation on lagged and nonlagged cells, to examine how the visual response pattern of lagged cells could be modified by PBR stimulation and to examine whether the physiological criteria used to classify lagged and nonlagged cells are applicable during increased PBR input to the LGN. During PBR stimulation, the visual response was enhanced to a similar degree for lagged and nonlagged cells and the latency to half-rise of the visual response was reduced, particularly for the lagged X cells. The latency to half-fall of the visual response of lagged cells was not changed by PBR stimulation. Accordingly, the division of LGN cells into lagged and nonlagged cells based on visual response latencies was maintained during PBR stimulation. The initial suppression that a visual stimulus evokes in lagged cells was resistant to the effects of PBR stimulation. For the lagged cells, the largest response increase occurred for the initial part of the visual response. For the nonlagged cells, the largest increase occurred for the tonic part of the response. The results support the hypothesis that the differences in temporal response properties between lagged and nonlagged cells belong to the basic distinctions between these cell classes.