The neural basis of temporal processing
- PMID: 15217335
- DOI: 10.1146/annurev.neuro.27.070203.144247
The neural basis of temporal processing
Abstract
A complete understanding of sensory and motor processing requires characterization of how the nervous system processes time in the range of tens to hundreds of milliseconds (ms). Temporal processing on this scale is required for simple sensory problems, such as interval, duration, and motion discrimination, as well as complex forms of sensory processing, such as speech recognition. Timing is also required for a wide range of motor tasks from eyelid conditioning to playing the piano. Here we review the behavioral, electrophysiological, and theoretical literature on the neural basis of temporal processing. These data suggest that temporal processing is likely to be distributed among different structures, rather than relying on a centralized timing area, as has been suggested in internal clock models. We also discuss whether temporal processing relies on specialized neural mechanisms, which perform temporal computations independent of spatial ones. We suggest that, given the intricate link between temporal and spatial information in most sensory and motor tasks, timing and spatial processing are intrinsic properties of neural function, and specialized timing mechanisms such as delay lines, oscillators, or a spectrum of different time constants are not required. Rather temporal processing may rely on state-dependent changes in network dynamics.
Similar articles
-
The neural representation of time.Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2004 Apr;14(2):225-32. doi: 10.1016/j.conb.2004.03.013. Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2004. PMID: 15082329 Review.
-
Neural dynamics based timing in the subsecond to seconds range.Adv Exp Med Biol. 2014;829:101-17. doi: 10.1007/978-1-4939-1782-2_6. Adv Exp Med Biol. 2014. PMID: 25358707 Review.
-
Population clocks: motor timing with neural dynamics.Trends Cogn Sci. 2010 Dec;14(12):520-7. doi: 10.1016/j.tics.2010.09.002. Trends Cogn Sci. 2010. PMID: 20889368 Free PMC article.
-
Spatially localized distortions of event time.Curr Biol. 2006 Mar 7;16(5):472-9. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2006.01.032. Curr Biol. 2006. PMID: 16527741
-
Space, time and learning in the hippocampus: how fine spatial and temporal scales are expanded into population codes for behavioral control.Neural Netw. 2007 Mar;20(2):182-93. doi: 10.1016/j.neunet.2006.11.007. Epub 2007 Jan 11. Neural Netw. 2007. PMID: 17222533
Cited by
-
Perception of duration in the parvocellular system.Front Integr Neurosci. 2012 Mar 28;6:14. doi: 10.3389/fnint.2012.00014. eCollection 2012. Front Integr Neurosci. 2012. PMID: 22470323 Free PMC article.
-
Computation Through Neural Population Dynamics.Annu Rev Neurosci. 2020 Jul 8;43:249-275. doi: 10.1146/annurev-neuro-092619-094115. Annu Rev Neurosci. 2020. PMID: 32640928 Free PMC article. Review.
-
Delay activity of saccade-related neurons in the caudal dentate nucleus of the macaque cerebellum.J Neurophysiol. 2013 Apr;109(8):2129-44. doi: 10.1152/jn.00906.2011. Epub 2013 Jan 30. J Neurophysiol. 2013. PMID: 23365182 Free PMC article.
-
Molecular evidence for two-stage learning and partial laterality in eyeblink conditioning of mice.Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2006 Apr 4;103(14):5549-54. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0601150103. Epub 2006 Mar 28. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2006. PMID: 16569693 Free PMC article.
-
Relative timing: from behaviour to neurons.Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2014 Jan 20;369(1637):20120472. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2012.0472. Print 2014 Mar 5. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2014. PMID: 24446505 Free PMC article. Review.
Publication types
MeSH terms
Grants and funding
LinkOut - more resources
Full Text Sources
