Floccular complex spike response to transparent retinal slip

The flocculus of the rabbit is involved in the plasticity of compensatory e ye movements. It is generally assumed that the climbing fiber input to floc cular Purkinje cells encodes "retinal slip," which in turn would be a measu re for the oculomotor performance error. To test this, we used transparent motion stimuli, creating a retinal slip signal that broke up this relation. We recorded the ensuing oculomotor behavior and complex spike activity of floccular Purkinje cells. Complex spike modulation in response to transpare nt stimulation was identical to that of a single optokinetic pattern, despi te considerably different retinal slip. These results suggest that the clim bing fiber code may be effectively related to the eye movement performance error, rather than to retinal slip.