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The Journal of Neuroscience, January 15, 2003, 23(2):716-724
Interaural Time Difference Discrimination Thresholds for
Single Neurons in the Inferior Colliculus of Guinea Pigs
Trevor M.
Shackleton1,
Bernt C.
Skottun2,
Robert
H.
Arnott1, and
Alan R.
Palmer1
1 Medical Research Council Institute of Hearing
Research, University Park, Nottingham, NG7 2RD, United Kingdom, and
2 Skottun Research, Piedmont, California 94611-5154
Sensitivity to changes in the interaural time difference
(ITD) of 50 msec tones was measured in single units in the inferior colliculus of urethane-anesthetized guinea pigs. ITD functions were
measured with 100 repeats and fine spacing (100 points per cycle). The
just noticeable difference (jnd) for ITD was determined using receiver
operating characteristic (ROC) analysis of the spike-count distribution
at each ITD. The jnd became progressively smaller as the signal
frequency increased from 50 to 800 Hz but became unmeasurable above 1 kHz. The lowest jnds (30 µsec) were comparable with human jnds,
indicating that there is sufficient information in the firings of
individual neurons to permit discrimination without obligatory pooling.
ROC analysis requires the choice of a reference ITD from which the jnd
may be found by stepping the target ITD through the ITD function. For
each neuron the reference was chosen to minimize the jnd. The lowest
jnd was usually for ipsilateral leading references, near the minimum of
the ITD function where the variance was also low, but where the slope
was nearing its steepest. This was despite the peak of the ITD function
occurring for contralateral leading stimuli. When the reference ITD was on midline, a jnd could be obtained by looking for firing rates either
greater or smaller than the firing rate at midline. The lower jnd was
usually obtained by looking for a decrease in firing rate. As duration
increased, jnds either decreased or increased, depending on unit type,
whereas when level increased, jnds generally increased.
Key words:
ITD; jnd; discrimination threshold; inferior
colliculus; guinea pig; binaural; interaural time difference
Copyright © 2003 Society for Neuroscience 0270-6474/03/232716-09$05.00/0
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