Segmentation by color influences responses of motion-sensitive neurons in the cortical middle temporal visual area.

We previously showed that human subjects are better able to discriminate the direction of a motion signal in dynamic noise when the signal is distinguished (segmented) from the noise by color. This finding suggested a hitherto unexplored avenue of interaction between motion and color pathways in the primate visual system. To examine whether chromatic segmentation exerts a similar influence on cortical neurons that contribute to motion direction discrimination, we have now compared the discriminative capacity of single MT neurons and psychophysical observers viewing motion signals with and without chromatic segmentation. All data were obtained from rhesus monkeys trained to discriminate motion direction in dynamic stimuli containing varying proportions of coherently moving (signal) and randomly moving (noise) dots. We obtained psychophysical and neurophysiological data in the same animals, on the same trials, and using the same visual display. Chromatic segmentation of the signal from the noise enhanced both neuronal and psychophysical sensitivity to the motion signal but had a smaller influence on neuronal than on psychophysical sensitivity. Hence the ratio of neuronal to psychophysical thresholds, one measure of the relation between neuronal and psychophysical performance, depended on chromatic segmentation. Increased neuronal sensitivity to chromatically segmented displays stemmed from larger and less noisy responses to motion in the preferred directions of the neurons, suggesting that specialized mechanisms influence responses in the motion pathway when color segments motion signal in visual scenes. These findings lead us to reevaluate potential mechanisms for pooling of MT responses and the role of MT in motion perception.