科学家发现鸟类中感知意识的神经关联
作者：小柯机器人 发布时间：2020/9/27 10:23:22
德国图宾根大学Andreas Nieder等研究人员发现鸟类中感知意识的神经关联。2020年9月25日出版的《科学》杂志发表了这一研究成果。
研究人员发现执行视觉检测任务的乌鸦皮层端脑中单个神经元反应与鸟类对刺激存在或不存在的感知有关，并认为这是鸟类意识的经验标记。神经元活动遵循一个暂时的双阶段过程，其中第一个活动成分主要反映身体刺激强度，而第二个成分预测乌鸦的知觉报告。
这些结果表明，在哺乳动物出现之前或至少在鸟类谱系中独立出现了感觉意识的神经基础，并不一定需要大脑皮层。
据介绍，可以有意识地获取和报告的主观经验与大脑皮层有关。知觉意识是否也可以由缺乏大脑皮层分层的大脑（如鸟脑）引起仍未知。
附：英文原文
Title:A neural correlate of sensory consciousness in a corvid bird
Author:Andreas Nieder*, View ORCID ProfileLysann Wagener, View ORCID ProfilePaul Rinnert
Issue&Volume:25 Sep 2020
Abstract: Subjective experiences that can be consciously accessed and reported are associated with the cerebral cortex. Whether sensory consciousness can also arise from differently organized brains that lack a layered cerebral cortex, such as the bird brain, remains unknown. We show that single-neuron responses in the pallial endbrain of crows performing a visual detection task correlate with the birds’ perception about stimulus presence or absence and argue that this is an empirical marker of avian consciousness. Neuronal activity follows a temporal two-stage process in which the first activity component mainly reflects physical stimulus intensity, whereas the later component predicts the crows’ perceptual reports. These results suggest that the neural foundations that allow sensory consciousness arose either before the emergence of mammals or independently in at least the avian lineage and do not necessarily require a cerebral cortex.
DOI:DOI: 10.1126/science.abb1447
Source: https://science.sciencemag.org/content/369/6511/1626
期刊信息
Science：《科学》，创刊于1880年。隶属于美国科学促进会，最新IF：41.037