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The Journal of Neuroscience, April 11, 2007, 27(15):4178-4181; doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.5468-06.2007

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Behavioral/Systems/Cognitive
Visual Phosphene Perception Modulated by Subthreshold Crossmodal Sensory Stimulation

Ciro Ramos-Estebanez, Lotfi B. Merabet, Katsuyuki Machii, Felipe Fregni, Gregor Thut, Timothy A. Wagner, Vicenzo Romei, Amir Amedi, and Alvaro Pascual-Leone

Berenson-Allen Center for Noninvasive Brain Stimulation, Department of Neurology, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115

Correspondence should be addressed to Dr. Alvaro Pascual-Leone, Center for Noninvasive Brain Stimulation, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center–Harvard Medical School, 330 Brookline Avenue, Boston, MA 02215. Email: apleone{at}bidmc.harvard.edu

Crossmodal sensory interactions serve to integrate behaviorally relevant sensory stimuli. In this study, we investigated the effect of modulating crossmodal interactions between visual and somatosensory stimuli that in isolation do not reach perceptual awareness. When a subthreshold somatosensory stimulus was delivered within close spatiotemporal congruency to the expected site of perception of a phosphene, a subthreshold transcranial magnetic stimulation pulse delivered to the occipital cortex evoked a visual percept. The results suggest that under subthreshold conditions of visual and somatosensory stimulation, crossmodal interactions presented in a spatially and temporally specific manner can sum up to become behaviorally significant. These interactions may reflect an underlying anatomical connectivity and become further enhanced by attention modulation mechanisms.

Key words: phosphenes; crossmodal; subthreshold; tactile; visual cortex; TMS

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Received Dec. 18, 2006; revised Feb. 10, 2007; accepted Feb. 13, 2007.

Correspondence should be addressed to Dr. Alvaro Pascual-Leone, Center for Noninvasive Brain Stimulation, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center–Harvard Medical School, 330 Brookline Avenue, Boston, MA 02215. Email: apleone{at}bidmc.harvard.edu

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