Canal-Otolith Interactions After Off-Vertical Axis Rotations. II. Spatiotemporal Properties of Roll and Pitch Postrotatory Vestibuloocular Reflexes
Department of Neurology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland Submitted 14 April 2004; accepted in final form 31 October 2004 We have examined the spatiotemporal characteristics of postrotatory eye velocity after roll and pitch off-vertical axis rotations (OVAR). Three rhesus monkeys were place...
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Published in | Journal of neurophysiology Vol. 93; no. 3; pp. 1633 - 1646 |
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Main Authors | , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
United States
Am Phys Soc
01.03.2005
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Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | Department of Neurology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
Submitted 14 April 2004;
accepted in final form 31 October 2004
We have examined the spatiotemporal characteristics of postrotatory eye velocity after roll and pitch off-vertical axis rotations (OVAR). Three rhesus monkeys were placed in one of 3 orientations on a 3-dimensional (3D) turntable: upright (90° roll or pitch OVAR), 45° nose-up (45° roll OVAR), and 45° left ear-down (45° pitch OVAR). Subjects were then rotated at ±60°/s around the naso-occipital or interaural axis and stopped after 10 turns, in one of 7 final head orientations, each separated by 30°. We found that postrotatory eye velocity showed horizontalvertical components after roll OVAR and horizontaltorsional components after pitch OVAR that varied systematically as a function of final head orientation. The quantitative analysis suggests that, in contrast to the analogous yaw OVAR paradigm, a system of up to 3 real, gravity-dependent eigenvectors and eigenvalues determines the spatiotemporal characteristics of the residual eye velocities after roll and pitch OVAR. One of these eigenvectors closely aligned with gravity, whereas the other 2 determined the orientation of the earth horizontal plane. We propose that the spatial characteristics of eye velocity after roll and pitch OVAR follow the physical constraints of stationary orientation in a gravitational field and reflect the brains best estimate of head-in-space orientation within an internal representation of 3D space.
Address for reprint requests and other correspondence: B.J.M. Hess, Frauenklinikstrasse 26, CH-8091 Zürich, Switzerland (E-mail: bhess{at}neurol.unizh.ch ) |
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Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-2 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-1 content type line 23 ObjectType-Article-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 |
ISSN: | 0022-3077 1522-1598 |
DOI: | 10.1152/jn.00383.2004 |