Visual receptive fields and their images in superior colliculus of the cat.

1. The receptive fields of collicular neurons in the cat, recorded in a single microelectrode penetration, were not centered on a point in visual space, but nested eccentrically with the smaller fields displaced toward the area centralis. The eccentric nesting was not eliminated by correcting the fields for the tangent screen distortion or by making penetrations normal to the collicular surface in coronal and parasagittal planes. These findings do not support the idea that collicular cells form topographically organized columns oriented normal to the collicular surface. 2. When the receptive fields were plotted in the visual coordinate system of the collicular map, the nesting became much more concentric, suggesting that the eccentric nesting of the receptive fields in visual space was largely a product of the retinotectal coordinate transformation. 3. The profile of a collicular receptive field, plotted in the collicular visual coordinate system is called the receptive-field image. Receptive-field images tended to have oval shapes with the long axis oriented mediolaterally. Clusters of receptive-field images, plotted for single penetrations, appeared similar wherever they occurred in the collicular map, suggesting that a common pattern of neural convergence determines the geometry of the receptive-field images in all parts of the colliculus. 4. The neural substrate of the receptive-field images was examined by tracing the theoretical patterns of neural activity which a point stimulus would produce in the retinotectal system. This analysis suggested that the shape and dimensions of the receptive-field images, and consequently the receptive fields, might be accounted for in large part by the geometry of collicular dendritic fields, the dimensions of the visual receptive fields of afferent fibers, and the retinotectal coordinate transformation. 5. Because it adjusts for the retinotectal distortion of visual space, the receptive-field image may be used to outline the distribution of collicular cells excited by a point stimulus. This makes it possible to show that a point stimulus activates large-field cells in the superficial gray layer over an area of about 2.5 by 1.5 mm in the central parts of the colliculus. It is suggested that such cells may organize the directional signals required by the oculomotor system for visual orienting behavior.