Matlab/octave Tools for the Visual Neuroscience Class I: Simulating Physiological Experiments in Motion Sensitive Neurons

The students of Visual Neuroscience have diverse backgrounds and are often not familiar with quantitative techniques. As a result, professors have problems to convey experimental and theoretical concepts that are mathematical in nature. Traditional (analytical) approaches used in physics or engineering are not appropriate for bio-oriented students. In this series of papers devoted to the Visual Neuroscience classroom we present a number of computational tools to help the students to learn-byplaying, as opposed to the classical analytical approach in physical sciences. In this work, we present tools for the simulation of neurophysiology experiments in the V1 and MT areas of cortex. Using linear models of V1 and MT cells as unknown black-boxes, the students measure the tuning properties of such systems by recording the responses they give to moving gratings or noise.