Speaker/Affiliation: Steve Lisberger Ph.D. Profe

ssor Physiology Department University of California San Francisco

When/Location: 1/28/08 12:00 PM SEA 4.244

Title of Talk: ''Variat

ion signal and noise in smooth pursuit eye movements''

Reception w

ith Refreshments at 11:30 AM

Abstract: How are sensory inputs repres

ented decoded and transformed into commands for movement? I will address

this general issue by analysis of trial-by-trial variation in neural and be

havioral measures during smooth pursuit eye movements. I will present evide

nce that most of the variation in the initiation of pursuit arises from noi

se in sensory representations. I also will show how the sensory-motor syst

em can be thought of in terms of noise reduction and noise addition at each
level of processing and how this approach can be used to understand the t

ransformation from vision to action.