VISUAL PROCESSING IN PIGEON TECTOFUGAL PATHWAY

The modest pigeon challenges our assumptions about what's required to perform complex visual tasks, performing comparably to humans at medical image diagnosis, art style discrimination, and orthographic processing. These examples demonstrate that pigeons achieve sophisticated visual cognition through processing hierarchies and generalisation abilities comparable to mammals, despite their smaller brain size and different brain structure that diverged evolutionarily more than 300 million years ago. Exploring the differences and similarities between avian and mammalian brains may shed light on the necessary and sufficient factors for higher visual processing. To investigate this, we targeted the higher visual areas of the tectofugal visual pathway of pigeon, specifically the Entopallium, Nidopallium Intermediale and Mesopallium Ventrolaterale. We performed acute electrophysiological recordings with dense electrode arrays spanning the three target areas, while presenting a battery of visual stimulation, including sparse noise and moving gratings. By characterising the receptive field properties, temporal dynamics, and functional organisation across these interconnected regions, we aim to reveal how the avian tectofugal pathway implements complex visual computations. Our multi-region approach will allow us to examine how visual information is hierarchically transformed through successive processing stages, potentially uncovering organisational principles shared with or distinct from the mammalian visual cortex.