Somesthesis and the Neurobiology of the Somatosensory Cortex

Book excerpt: This volume is a compilation of current research on somatosensation and its underlying mechanisms written by international experts from a broad range of disciplines. It is divided into six sections:· structural basis of information processing and neocortical neurotransmitters · psychophysics of somatosensation · cortical representation of somatosensation · sensory-motor interface · neuronal population behavior · cortical neurocomputation and modelling. It highlights not only important new findings but also novel methods and technologies applied to major unresolved issues in the field of neuroscience. The number of methods for investigating the neural mechanisms of soma-tosensory perception has grown substantially in the last decade. The book encompasses levels of inquiry from ionic channels, single unit recordings of neural activity, and functional brain imaging of the coordinated activity of large neuronal ensembles to human psychophysics of controlled somatic stimulation. This work is of great value for researchers and students interested in the dynamic neuronal mechanisms involved in the complex processes of sensory perception and provides a picture of our present understanding of the neural representation of the external world relayed through the somatosensory system.