Sven P Heinrich1, Michael Bach. 1. Elektrophysiologisches Labor, Univ.-Augenklinik Freiburg, Killianstr. 5, 79106 Freiburg, Germany. sven.heinrich@uni-freiburg.de
Abstract
OBJECTIVE: Motion visual evoked potentials (motion VEPs) are used in clinical diagnosis and basic research. Employing steady-state rather than the usual transient motion VEPs simplifies statistical evaluation and might drastically reduce examination durations. Protocols for recording transient motion-onset VEPs usually involve fairly long recovery intervals between trials to avoid neural adaptation. This is not feasible for steady-state VEPs. We investigated how adaptation affects the steady-state motion VEP. METHODS: Oscillatory (13.3rev/s) and continuous uni-directional random-dot motion served as adaptation stimuli. Steady-state motion VEPs and, for comparison, transient motion VEPs were recorded. RESULTS: In the first experiment, we investigated how adaptation affects the recordings. Contrary to our expectation, we did not find any sizable effect. However, there was a large inter-individual variability in steady-state amplitude and no correlation across subjects between transient and steady-state amplitude. In the second experiment, we confirmed that the steady-state VEP reflects veridical motion processing by assessing its susceptibility to uni-directional pre-adaptation. CONCLUSIONS: Taken together, the results suggest that steady-state motion VEPs provide a fast method of recording motion responses without suffering from adaptation, but at the expense of inter-individual reproducibility.
OBJECTIVE: Motion visual evoked potentials (motion VEPs) are used in clinical diagnosis and basic research. Employing steady-state rather than the usual transient motion VEPs simplifies statistical evaluation and might drastically reduce examination durations. Protocols for recording transient motion-onset VEPs usually involve fairly long recovery intervals between trials to avoid neural adaptation. This is not feasible for steady-state VEPs. We investigated how adaptation affects the steady-state motion VEP. METHODS: Oscillatory (13.3rev/s) and continuous uni-directional random-dot motion served as adaptation stimuli. Steady-state motion VEPs and, for comparison, transient motion VEPs were recorded. RESULTS: In the first experiment, we investigated how adaptation affects the recordings. Contrary to our expectation, we did not find any sizable effect. However, there was a large inter-individual variability in steady-state amplitude and no correlation across subjects between transient and steady-state amplitude. In the second experiment, we confirmed that the steady-state VEP reflects veridical motion processing by assessing its susceptibility to uni-directional pre-adaptation. CONCLUSIONS: Taken together, the results suggest that steady-state motion VEPs provide a fast method of recording motion responses without suffering from adaptation, but at the expense of inter-individual reproducibility.
Authors: Ruth Hamilton; Michael Bach; Sven P Heinrich; Michael B Hoffmann; J Vernon Odom; Daphne L McCulloch; Dorothy A Thompson Journal: Doc Ophthalmol Date: 2020-06-02 Impact factor: 2.379