PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Stefan Everling
AU  - Michael C. Dorris
AU  - Raymond M. Klein
AU  - Douglas P. Munoz
TI  - Role of Primate Superior Colliculus in Preparation and Execution of Anti-Saccades and Pro-Saccades
AID  - 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.19-07-02740.1999
DP  - 1999 Apr 01
TA  - The Journal of Neuroscience
PG  - 2740--2754
VI  - 19
IP  - 7
4099  - http://www.jneurosci.org/content/19/7/2740.short
4100  - http://www.jneurosci.org/content/19/7/2740.full
SO  - J. Neurosci.1999 Apr 01; 19
AB  - We investigated how the brain switches between the preparation of a movement where a stimulus is the target of the movement, and a movement where a stimulus serves as a landmark for an instructed movement elsewhere. Monkeys were trained on a pro-/anti-saccade paradigm in which they either had to generate a pro-saccade toward a visual stimulus or an anti-saccade away from the stimulus to its mirror position, depending on the color of an initial fixation point. Neural activity was recorded in the superior colliculus (SC), a structure that is known to be involved in the generation of fast saccades, to determine whether it was also involved in the generation of anti-saccades. On anti-saccade trials, fixation during the instruction period was associated with an increased activity of collicular fixation-related neurons and a decreased activity of saccade-related neurons. Stimulus-related and saccade-related activity was reduced on anti-saccade trials. Our results demonstrate that the anti-saccade task involves (and may require) the attenuation of preparatory and stimulus-related activity in the SC to avoid unwanted pro-saccades. Because the attenuated pre-saccade activity that we found in the SC may be insufficient by itself to elicit correct anti-saccades, additional movement signals from other brain areas are presumably required.