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Published January 1, 1981 | Published
Journal Article Open

Neuronal and behavioral sensitivity to binaural time differences in the owl

Abstract

We demonstrated that ongoing time disparity (OTD) was a sufficient cue for the azimuthal component of receptive fields of auditory neurons in the owl (Tyto alba) midbrain and that OTDs were sufficient to mediate meaningful behavioral responses. We devised a technique which enabled us to change easily between free field and dichotic stimuli while recording from single auditory neurons in the owl mesencephalicus lateralis pars dorsalis (MLD). MLD neurons with restricted spatial receptive fields ("space-mapped neurons") showed marked sensitivity to specific ongoing time disparities. The magnitudes of these disparities were in the behaviorally significant range of tens of microseconds. The ongoing time disparities were correlated significantly with the azimuthal center of receptor fields. Space-mapped neurons were insensitive to transient disparities. MLD neurons which were not space- mapped, i.e., were omnidirectional, did not show any sensitivity to specific OTDs. We confirmed the behavioral relevance of OTD as a cue for localizing a sound in azimuth by presenting OTD differences to tame owls. Using head turning as an assay, we showed that OTD was a sufficient cue for the azimuth of a sound. The relationship between azimuth and OTD obtained from our neurophysiological experiments matched closely the relationship obtained from our behavioral experiments.

Additional Information

© 1981 Society for Neuroscience. For the first six months after publication SfN's license will be exclusive. Beginning six months after publication the Work will be made freely available to the public on SfN's website to copy, distribute, or display under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). We thank our electrical engineers, David Hodge, John Powers, and Mike Walsh, for their assistance, Herb Adams for constructing mechanical devices, Eugene and Cynthia Akutagawa for the care of owls, and Dr. Eric Knudsen for critically reading the first draft of this paper. This work was supported by National Institutes of Health Grant NS 14617-02 to M. K. and a Helen Hay Whitney postdoctoral fellowship to A.M.

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August 19, 2023
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