The spinning dancer illusion and spontaneous brain fluctuations: An fMRI study.

The spinning dancer illusion and spontaneous brain fluctuations: An fMRI study.
Neurocase. 2013 Aug 28;
Authors: Bernal B, Guillen M, Marquez JC
Abstract
The brain activation associated with the Spinning Dancer Illusion, a cognitive visual illusion, is not entirely known. Inferences from other study modalities point to the involvement of the dorso-parieto-occipital areas in the spontaneous switchings of perception in other bistable non-kinetic illusions. fMRI is a mature technique used to investigate the brain responses associated with mental changes. Resting-state fMRI is a novel technique that may help ascertain the effects of spontaneous brain changes in the top-down regulation of visual perception. The purpose of this report is to describe the brain activation associated with the subjective illusory changes of perception of a kinetic bistable stimulus. We hypothesize that there is a relationship between the perception phases with the very slow cortical spontaneous fluctuations, recently described. A single normal subject who was trained to produce voluntarily perception phase switches underwent a series of fMRI studies whose blocks were either defined post-hoc or accordingly with a predefined timeline to assess spontaneous and voluntarily evoked visual perception switches, respectively. Correlation of findings with resting-state fMRI and independent component analysis of the task series was sought. Phases of the rotation direction were fou...

Source: Neurocase - August 28, 2013 Category: Neurology Authors: Bernal B, Guillen M, Marquez JC Tags: Neurocase Source Type: research