Binocular interaction and depth sensitivity in striate and prestriate cortex of behaving rhesus monkey

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Abstract
Monkeys were trained to fixate monocularly and binocularly a small spot of light while single dark or bright bars moving across a frontoparallel plane were presented at different depths (.+-. 10 cm at a fixation distance of 38 or 57 cm). Activity of neurons in foveal striate (A17) and prestriate (A18) cortex were recorded with metal microelectrodes. Binocular interaction was observed for nearly all cells. Neurons giving similar responses to monocular stimulation of either eye (ocular balance) were usually depth tuned: they displayed binocular facilitation at some optimal distance in the neighborhood of the fixation point, and often inhibitory flanks nearer and farther. Depth sensitive neurons that responded differently to separate stimulation of the 2 eyes (ocular unbalance) were either inhibitory tuned at some distance about fixation or had asymmetric response profile: activation (suppression) by stimuli in front of, and suppression (activation) by stimuli behind the fixation plane. Disparity sensitive neurons in foveal striate and prestriate cortex may contribute to mechanisms for binocular depth perception as well as to mechanisms for vergence control.

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