Specific guidelines for time and space of multisensory plasticity in the superior colliculus.

Abstract

The potential to combine facts from exceptional senses, and thereby facilitate detecting and localizing events, commonly develops regularly in cat superior colliculus (SC) neurons. Multisensory integration in SC neurons depends on the spatial and temporal relationships of cross-modal cues. Here, we reveal that the parallel process of short-term plasticity during adulthood that would adapt multisensory integration to reliable changes in environmental conditions. The short-term experience altered the temporal preferences of SC neurons, this short-term plasticity was limited to changes in cross-modal timing (a factor commonly induced by events at different distances from the receiver. Nonetheless the plasticity was no evident in response to changes in cross-modal spatial configuration.