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The Journal of Neuroscience, October 25, 2006, 26(43):11138-11147; doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3550-06.2006

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Behavioral/Systems/Cognitive
Integration of Auditory and Visual Communication Information in the Primate Ventrolateral Prefrontal Cortex

Tadashi Sugihara,¹ Mark D. Diltz,¹ Bruno B. Averbeck,^2,3 and Lizabeth M. Romanski¹

¹Departments of Neurobiology and Anatomy, University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, New York 14642, ²Center for Visual Science, University of Rochester, Rochester, New York 14627-0270, and ³Sobell Department of Motor Neuroscience and Movement Disorders, Institute of Neurology, University College London, London WC1N 3BG, United Kingdom

Correspondence should be addressed to Dr. Lizabeth M. Romanski, Associate Professor, Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14642. Email: Liz_romanski{at}urmc.rochester.edu

The integration of auditory and visual stimuli is crucial for recognizing objects, communicating effectively, and navigating through our complex world. Although the frontal lobes are involved in memory, communication, and language, there has been no evidence that the integration of communication information occurs at the single-cell level in the frontal lobes. Here, we show that neurons in the macaque ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC) integrate audiovisual communication stimuli. The multisensory interactions included both enhancement and suppression of a predominantly auditory or a predominantly visual response, although multisensory suppression was the more common mode of response. The multisensory neurons were distributed across the VLPFC and within previously identified unimodal auditory and visual regions (O'Scalaidhe et al., 1997; Romanski and Goldman-Rakic, 2002). Thus, our study demonstrates, for the first time, that single prefrontal neurons integrate communication information from the auditory and visual domains, suggesting that these neurons are an important node in the cortical network responsible for communication.

Key words: vocalization; face; sensory integration; language; frontal lobe; cortex

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Received May 9, 2006; revised Sept. 16, 2006; accepted Sept. 18, 2006.

Correspondence should be addressed to Dr. Lizabeth M. Romanski, Associate Professor, Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14642. Email: Liz_romanski{at}urmc.rochester.edu

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