| The goal of our research is to understand the organizational and operational principles of information processing in the brain. Our main interest is in determining how modular-based cortical networks integrate the incoming sensory information in the somatosensory system. Our recent studies have investigated the information flow in the early stages of sensory processes in order to understand the neural mechanisms of texture perception. These studies have used combined psychophysical and neurophysiological experimentation to show that roughness perception (one dimension of texture perception) depends on SA1 (slowly adapting, type 1) mechanoreceptors. We are now characterizing the properties of cortical neurons in areas 3b, 1 and 2 with multiple microelectrodes to determine how neurons in each cortical area integrate or segregate the mechanoreceptive information from the hand. |
