PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Murphy, KM
AU  - Jones, DG
AU  - Van Sluyters, RC
TI  - Cytochrome-oxidase blobs in cat primary visual cortex
AID  - 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.15-06-04196.1995
DP  - 1995 Jun 01
TA  - The Journal of Neuroscience
PG  - 4196--4208
VI  - 15
IP  - 6
4099  - http://www.jneurosci.org/content/15/6/4196.short
4100  - http://www.jneurosci.org/content/15/6/4196.full
SO  - J. Neurosci.1995 Jun 01; 15
AB  - Cytochrome-oxidase blobs are central to two of the most influential ideas in contemporary visual neuroscience--cortical modularity and parallel processing pathways. In particular, the regular 2D array of cytochrome-oxidase-rich blobs in primate visual cortex is arguably the most compelling evidence for cortical modularity and has been hypothesized to mark a separate processing stream through the visual cortex. Although previously a variety of mammals have been studied, blobs have only been demonstrated in the visual cortex of primates, which has led to the conclusion that blobs represent a primate-specific feature of visual cortical organization. Here we demonstrate the presence of cytochrome-oxidase blobs in a nonprimate species. Throughout the full tangential extent of layers II-III in cat visual cortex the cytochrome-oxidase staining pattern is distinctly patchy, with the darkly stained blobs forming a regular 2D array. In addition, the blobs in cat visual cortex are functionally related to the underlying ocular dominance columns. The presence of cytochrome-oxidase blobs in the cat clearly demonstrates that they no longer can be considered a primate-specific feature of visual cortical organization.