FMRI OF MONKEY VISUAL-CORTEX

While functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is now used widely for demonstrating neural activity-related signals associated with perc eptual, motor, and cognitive processes in humans, to date this techniq ue has not been developed for use with nonhuman primates, fMRI in monk eys offers a potentially valuable experimental approach for investigat ing brain function, which will complement and aid existing techniques such as electrophysiology and the behavioral analysis of the effects o f brain lesions. There are, however, a number of significant technical challenges involved in using fMRI with monkeys. Here, we describe the procedures by which we have overcome these challenges to carry out su ccessful fMRI experiments in an alert monkey, and we present the first evidence of activity-related fMRI signals from monkey cerebral cortex .