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Effects Of Saccadic Eye Movements On Perception And Visual Memory.
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$255,750.00
Summary
We all make rapid eye movements, called saccades, three times a second all our waking lives. They allow us to direct our gaze at what catches our attention, but they sweep images across our retinas and alter all the linkages between the eyes and the brain. The question at the heart of this project is how the visual system maintains perceptual stability given the disruption to the flow of visual input that saccades necessarily cause. It has to do more than suppress disturbing signals; it has to l ....We all make rapid eye movements, called saccades, three times a second all our waking lives. They allow us to direct our gaze at what catches our attention, but they sweep images across our retinas and alter all the linkages between the eyes and the brain. The question at the heart of this project is how the visual system maintains perceptual stability given the disruption to the flow of visual input that saccades necessarily cause. It has to do more than suppress disturbing signals; it has to link the present with the past. In recent years we and others have made substantial progress toward answering this question. In this project we plan a four-pronged attack that will take us further. We anticipate that our results will reveal how the visual system maintains and adjusts its representations of space and time, integrates signals from before and after saccades, and regulates the flow of information from memory to achieve a seamless melding of the present with the past. This project is not directed at any particular clinical problem, but disturbances of perception and memory are aspects of many clinical conditions. If we succeed in our aims what we discover will constitute a major scientific discovery which should find application to many conditions in which perception and memory are disturbed, from dyslexia to brain damage and even affective disorders such as schizophrenia and depression.Read moreRead less
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: Genes, Cognition And Brain Activity
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$428,602.00
Summary
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common psychiatric disorder of childhood that is marked by age-inappropriate levels of inattention and-or hyperactivity-impulsivity. The disorder appears genetic with a number of different genes likely contributing risk for ADHD. I will use a multi-modal (genetic, cognitive, neurochemical, physiological) approach to increase our understanding of the biological mechanisms leading from gene to disorder in ADHD.
Imaging The Brain Connectome In Typical And Atypical Development
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$318,768.00
Summary
My project will investigate how connections in the brain change during the transition from childhood to adolescence. Advanced neuroimaging techniques will be used to understand how different parts of the brain are connected to one another, and how this changes over time. I will examine typically developing children, as well as those with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in order to understand how neuropsychiatric disorders affect brain development.
The Genetics Of Cognitive Deficits In Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$675,512.00
Summary
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common psychiatric disorder of childhood that is marked by age-inappropriate levels of inattention and-or hyperactivity-impulsivity. The disorder appears genetic with a number of different genes likely contributing risk for ADHD. This project takes an innovative approach by asking whether there are different genetic profiles associated with children with ADHD who do or do not have neurocognitive deficits.
Motor Passivity Symptoms In Schizophrenia And Mental Representations Of The Body
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$220,180.00
Summary
Individuals with schizophrenia who report passivity symptoms feel that they are no longer in control of their movements and believe that their actions may be willed by some other power. This research aims to examine a set of mental processes which determine how the body is 'represented' in the brain and which, if disrupted, can lead to disorders of body experiences. The outcome of the study will lead to a greater understanding of passivity symptoms and can be used to plan interventions.
Interactions Between Afferent Channels In Vision: Basic Neurophysiology And Implications For The Pathology Of Dyslexia
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$423,662.00
Summary
We intend to study the interactions between different information channels in the primate visual system. The pathways from the eyes to the brain consist of different types of nerve fibres carrying distinct sorts of information. These channels have been believed to remain separate as they transmit the information through various levels of the brain. Finally, in the neocortex, it has been suggested that the visual information goes along two major streams, one dorsally to the parietal cortex and th ....We intend to study the interactions between different information channels in the primate visual system. The pathways from the eyes to the brain consist of different types of nerve fibres carrying distinct sorts of information. These channels have been believed to remain separate as they transmit the information through various levels of the brain. Finally, in the neocortex, it has been suggested that the visual information goes along two major streams, one dorsally to the parietal cortex and the other ventrally to the temporal cortex. Based upon recent studies, we question this strict segregation of the pathways and propose to study how interactions occur between the two streams and whether the two channels do come together at early levels of the visual pathway. We will also test our idea whether, of the dorsal and ventral streams, one stream might actually gate the other and decide what goes through the other stream. In fact, from our own recent studies, we have reason to believe that the way our attentional system might operate to select salient aspects of the visual scene may be through the dorsal stream selecting what goes into the ventral stream, which seems to be responsible for identifying objects. In the proposed project we will test this idea rigorously. From various lines of evidence, we also argue that the neural mechanisms that underlie this attentional spotlight is exploited by human children when they learn to read. It follows that any defect in the dorsal pathway or in the fibres and cells that feed into this will cause difficulties in reading. We believe this to be the underlying problem in dyslexic children. The project will undertake a number of experiments to test this idea.Read moreRead less
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorde(ADHD) is the most prevalent mental disorder of childhood affecting around 7.5% of Australian school age children. The disorder is strongly genetic and causes significant impairments in academic functioning, family and peer relations with sufferers at increased risk for drug abuse. Identification and characterisation of rare mutations will enhance our knowledge of the neurobiology and advance the search for next generation drug treatments for the disorder.
Imaging Genetics Of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$321,767.00
Summary
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common psychiatric disorder of childhood that is marked by age-inappropriate levels of inattention and-or hyperactivity-impulsivity. The disorder appears genetic with a number of different genes likely contributing risk for ADHD. This project takes an innovative approach by asking how risk genes for ADHD influence the brain activity of children with ADHD when they pay attention
Functional Interactions Between Primate Cortical Areas In Tasks Involving Attention And Short-term Memory
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$267,280.00
Summary
To navigate and operate in the cluttered and dynamic sensory world around us, our brains need to be able to attend to specific objects or features in the environment, identify them and also know where they exist at any one instant of time, prior to performing the appropriate action. The attention, memory, decision and motor components involved in this process possibly involve a variety of cortical areas and neuronal operations. The special primate preparation we have developed permits us to eluc ....To navigate and operate in the cluttered and dynamic sensory world around us, our brains need to be able to attend to specific objects or features in the environment, identify them and also know where they exist at any one instant of time, prior to performing the appropriate action. The attention, memory, decision and motor components involved in this process possibly involve a variety of cortical areas and neuronal operations. The special primate preparation we have developed permits us to elucidate at a neuronal level many of these brain mechanisms. By recording neuronal activities in two different cortical areas simultaneously as the monkey performs a memory task that he has been trained on, we will test the following ideas: (1) A cortical region in the dorsal, parietal stream directs spatial attention by gating other visual areas to process only a selected region of the visual world (2) A region in the ventral, temporal stream directs attention to specific features in the visual world by gating earlier cortical areas (3) The parietal cortical areas that mediate intention for action hold the relevant information in working memory till it is forwarded to the more anterior premotor areas. These experiments have the potential to reveal the basic neuronal scheme that underpins functions such as attention, visual recognition and memory, which are impaired in many neurological disorders.Read moreRead less
Neuronal Linking Of Attention, Perception And Action
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$586,469.00
Summary
We are able to perceive and interact with the environment around us primarily because a filter of attention selects just the objects or features of relevance in the world and helps to make appropriate motor responses. This project will study how attentional networks of the brain operate to link our perception and action. An understanding of this process is fundamental to revealing the underlying pathology in many neurological conditions where attention is impaired.