An intricately patterned prefronto-caudate projection in the rhesus monkey.

The distribution of prefronto-caudate fibers in the caudate nucleus was studied autoradiographically in monkeys of various ages in which tritiated amino acids had been injected into the middle one-third of the length of the dorsal bank of the principal sulcus. The results indicate that, contrary to previous reports which had suggested a projection to only the head of the caudate nucleus, area 9 of Brodmann projects to the entire length of the nucleus. In the head of the caudate nucleus the cortico-caudate fibers are distributed in a pattern which is remarkable in two respects. First, the grains are not uniformly distributed but rather are segregated into clusters separated from one another by territories in which grain density does not exceed background. Second, individual clusters of grains, circular or elliptical in shape, surround grain free cores. These patterns of fiber distribution within the head of the nucleus are more sharply defined in newborn than in older monkeys. Our findings suggest that the caudate nucleus is organized more as an anatomic and functional mosaic than as the homogeneously organized structure that it is commonly considered to be.