The Retinal Distribution Of Neurons With Different Integrate Field Properties In The Cat Primary Visual Cortex

Neurons in the primary visual cortex (V1) of cat have an extra-receptive field (ERF)beyond the classical receptive field (CRF) that can either inhibit or facilitate the responseelicited by stimulation within the CRF. We have analyzed the retinal distribution of theERFs for a total of 268 V1 cells in relation to the facilitatory or inhibitory property of thecells.Our results show that the cells with inhibitory ERF had more central localizations(relative to the fovea) of their CRFs-80.1% of the inhibitory neurons have eccentricitiessmaller than 4 degree, and the cells with facilitatory ERFs distribute more peripherally-53.3% of the facilitatory neurons have eccentricities larger than 4 degree. Such distribution,combining with the findings that neurons with facilitatory ERFs respond preferentially tobroad field homogeneous textures and neurons with inhibitory ERFs are responsible todetecting differences in visual features, may suggests a center-surround differentiation ofthe retina in detecting object details with the central vision, and detecting the uniformbackground using the peripheral vision.