Laminar microcircuitry of visual cortex producing attention-associated electric fields

Abstract
Data availability
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Abstract

Cognitive operations are widely studied by measuring electric fields through EEG and ECoG. However, despite their widespread use, the neural circuitry giving rise to these signals remains unknown because the functional architecture of cortical columns producing attention-associated electric fields has not been explored. Here we detail the laminar cortical circuitry underlying an attention-associated electric field measured over posterior regions of the brain in humans and monkeys. First, we identified visual cortical area V4 as one plausible contributor to this attention-associated electric field through inverse modeling of cranial EEG in macaque monkeys performing a visual attention task. Next, we performed laminar neurophysiological recordings on the prelunate gyrus and identified the electric-field-producing dipoles as synaptic activity in distinct cortical layers of area V4. Specifically, activation in the extragranular layers of cortex resulted in the generation of the attention-associated dipole. Feature selectivity of a given cortical column determined the overall contribution to this electric field. Columns selective for the attended feature contributed more to the electric field than columns selective for a different feature. Lastly, the laminar profile of synaptic activity generated by V4 was sufficient to produce an attention-associated signal measurable outside of the column. These findings suggest that the top-down recipient cortical layers produce an attention-associated electric field that can be measured extracortically with the relative contribution of each column depending upon the underlying functional architecture.

Data availability

Data supporting the findings documented in this study are freely available online through Dryad at https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.djh9w0w15.

The following data sets were generated

1. Westerberg JA
2. Schall M
3. Maier A
4. Woodman G
5. Schall J
(2021) Data from: Laminar microcircuitry of visual cortex producing attention-associated electric fields
Dryad Digital Repository, doi:10.5061/dryad.djh9w0w15.

http://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.djh9w0w15

Article and author information

Author details

Jacob A Westerberg

Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, United States

For correspondence
jacob.a.westerberg@vanderbilt.edu

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

"This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-5331-8707
Michelle S Schall

Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, United States

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
Alexander Maier

Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, United States

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

"This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-7250-502X
Geoffrey F Woodman

Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, United States

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
Jeffrey D Schall

Department of Biology, York University, Toronto, Canada

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

Funding

National Eye Institute (F31EY031293)

Jacob A Westerberg

National Eye Institute (P30EY008126)

Alexander Maier
Geoffrey F Woodman
Jeffrey D Schall

National Eye Institute (R01EY019882)

Geoffrey F Woodman
Jeffrey D Schall

National Eye Institute (R01EY008890)

Jeffrey D Schall

National Eye Institute (R01EY027402)

Alexander Maier

Office of the Director (S10OD021771)

Alexander Maier
Geoffrey F Woodman
Jeffrey D Schall

National Eye Institute (T32EY007135)

Jacob A Westerberg

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Ethics

Animal experimentation: Procedures were in accordance with National Institutes of Health Guidelines, Association for Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals, and approved by the Vanderbilt Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (Protocol M1700067) following United States Department of Agriculture and Public Health Services policies.

Copyright

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.