Gamma synchronization between V1 and V4 improves behavioral performance

Abstract

Motor behavior is often driven by visual stimuli, relying on efficient feedforward communication from lower to higher visual areas. The Communication-through-Coherence hypothesis proposes that interareal communication depends on coherence at an optimal phase relation. While previous studies have linked effective communication to enhanced interareal coherence, it remains unclear, whether this interareal coherence occurs at an optimal phase relation that actually improves the stimulus transmission to behavioral report. We recorded local field potentials simultaneously from areas V1 and V4 of macaque monkeys performing a selective visual attention task, during which they reported changes of the attended stimulus. Gamma synchronization between V1 and V4, immediately preceding the stimulus change, predicted subsequent reaction times (RTs). Crucially, RTs were systematically slowed as trial-by-trial interareal gamma phase relations deviated from the phase relation at which V1 and V4 synchronized on average. These effects were specific to the attended stimulus and not due to local power or phase inside V1 or V4. We conclude that interareal gamma synchronization occurs at the optimal phase relation and thereby improves interareal communication and the effective transformation of sensory inputs into motor responses.