MAPPING OF LATERAL GENICULATE-NUCLEUS ACTIVATION DURING VISUAL-STIMULATION IN HUMAN BRAIN USING FMRI

Functional magnetic resonance imaging has been successfully used to ma p the activation in the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) in both hemis pheres as well as the primary visual cortex (V1) during a checkerboard visual stimulation. The average blood oxygenation level dependent (BO LD) change in LGN was less than that in V1. However, the BOLD temporal responses were similar between LGN and V1. The activation in the pulv inar nucleus during visual perception was also detected, and its activ ated location could be separated from LGN in 3D images. The LGN activa tion between intersubject and intrasubject multiple trials was compare d. The results demonstrate that fMRI can reliably and robustly detect small subcortical nucleus activation in the human brain.