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Functional Interaction between Right Parietal and Bilateral Frontal Cortices during Visual Search Tasks Revealed Using Functional Magnetic Imaging and Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation

Ellison, A.; Ball, K.L.; Moseley, P.; Dowsett, J.; Smith, D.T.; Weis, S.; Lane, A.R.

Functional Interaction between Right Parietal and Bilateral Frontal Cortices during Visual Search Tasks Revealed Using Functional Magnetic Imaging and Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation Thumbnail


Authors

K.L. Ball

P. Moseley

J. Dowsett

S. Weis



Abstract

The existence of a network of brain regions which are activated when one undertakes a difficult visual search task is well established. Two primary nodes on this network are right posterior parietal cortex (rPPC) and right frontal eye fields. Both have been shown to be involved in the orientation of attention, but the contingency that the activity of one of these areas has on the other is less clear. We sought to investigate this question by using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) to selectively decrease activity in rPPC and then asking participants to perform a visual search task whilst undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging. Comparison with a condition in which sham tDCS was applied revealed that cathodal tDCS over rPPC causes a selective bilateral decrease in frontal activity when performing a visual search task. This result demonstrates for the first time that premotor regions within the frontal lobe and rPPC are not only necessary to carry out a visual search task, but that they work together to bring about normal function.

Citation

Ellison, A., Ball, K., Moseley, P., Dowsett, J., Smith, D., Weis, S., & Lane, A. (2014). Functional Interaction between Right Parietal and Bilateral Frontal Cortices during Visual Search Tasks Revealed Using Functional Magnetic Imaging and Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation. PLoS ONE, 9(4), Article e93767. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0093767

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Mar 10, 2014
Online Publication Date Apr 4, 2014
Publication Date Apr 4, 2014
Deposit Date Jun 10, 2014
Publicly Available Date Jun 12, 2014
Journal PLoS ONE
Publisher Public Library of Science
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 9
Issue 4
Article Number e93767
DOI https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0093767

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Publisher Licence URL
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Copyright Statement
© 2014 Ellison et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.





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