Functional resilience of the neural visual recognition system post-pediatric occipitotemporal resection
Michael C. Granovetter,
Anne Margarette S. Maallo,
Shouyu Ling,
Sophia Robert,
Erez Freud,
Christina Patterson,
Marlene Behrmann
Affiliations
Michael C. Granovetter
Department of Psychology and Neuroscience Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA; School of Medicine, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA; Departments of Pediatrics and Neurology, New York University, New York, NY 10016, USA; Corresponding author
Anne Margarette S. Maallo
Department of Psychology and Neuroscience Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA
Shouyu Ling
Department of Ophthalmology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA
Sophia Robert
Department of Psychology and Neuroscience Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA
Erez Freud
Department of Psychology, York University, Toronto, ON M3J 1P3, Canada
Christina Patterson
Department of Pediatrics, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA
Marlene Behrmann
Department of Psychology and Neuroscience Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA; Department of Ophthalmology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA; Corresponding author
Summary: Neural representations for visual stimuli typically emerge with a bilateral distribution across occipitotemporal cortex (OTC). Pediatric patients undergoing unilateral OTC resection offer an opportunity to evaluate whether representations for visual stimulus individuation can sufficiently develop in a single OTC. Here, we assessed the non-resected hemisphere of patients with pediatric resection within (n = 9) and outside (n = 12) OTC, as well as healthy controls’ two hemispheres (n = 21). Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we mapped category selectivity (CS), and representations for visual stimulus individuation (for faces, objects, and words) with repetition suppression (RS). There were no group differences in CS or RS. However, OTC resection patients’ accuracy on face and object (but not word) recognition was lower than controls’. The neuroimaging results highlight neural resilience following damage to the contralateral homologue. Critically, however, a single OTC does not suffice for typical behavior, and, thereby, implicates the necessary contributions of bilateral OTC for visual recognition.
