美国德克萨斯大学Kathryn Bonnen研究组发现，双目观察几何形状塑造了动态三维环境的神经表征。该项研究成果2019年12月2日在线发表在《自然—神经科学》上。

研究人员开发了一个包含投影几何的计算模型，将三维（3D）环境映射到两个视网膜上。他们证明，这种映射从根本上塑造了皮层神经元和知觉的相应方面的调整。对于3D运动，该模型解释了现有电生理数据中存在的非典型调整以及人类行为中明显的感知错误的独特模式。从皮质活动中解码世界的过程，很大程度上受到将环境与感觉上皮联系起来的几何形状的影响。

据悉，感觉信号引起神经活动的模式，被大脑用来推断环境的特性。对于视觉系统，大量工作集中在额额平行刺激特征和双眼视差的显示上。但是，从视网膜刺激推断物理环境的特性是一个独特且更具挑战性的计算问题-这是大脑必须实际完成的工作，以支持感知和动作。

附：英文原文

Title: Binocular viewing geometry shapes the neural representation of the dynamic three-dimensional environment

Author: Kathryn Bonnen, Thaddeus B. Czuba, Jake A. Whritner, Adam Kohn, Alexander C. Huk, Lawrence K. Cormack

Issue&Volume: 2019-12-02

Abstract: Sensory signals give rise to patterns of neural activity, which the brain uses to infer properties of the environment. For the visual system, considerable work has focused on the representation of frontoparallel stimulus features and binocular disparities. However, inferring the properties of the physical environment from retinal stimulation is a distinct and more challenging computational problem—this is what the brain must actually accomplish to support perception and action. Here we develop a computational model that incorporates projective geometry, mapping the three-dimensional (3D) environment onto the two retinae. We demonstrate that this mapping fundamentally shapes the tuning of cortical neurons and corresponding aspects of perception. For 3D motion, the model explains the strikingly non-canonical tuning present in existing electrophysiological data and distinctive patterns of perceptual errors evident in human behavior. Decoding the world from cortical activity is strongly affected by the geometry that links the environment to the sensory epithelium.

DOI: 10.1038/s41593-019-0544-7

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-019-0544-7