Dynamic cortical activation in mental image processing revealed by biomagnetic measurement.

The mental rotation task has been reported to activate the human parietal and extra-striate areas, based on the results of fMRI and PET analysis. In the present study, we investigated the dynamic properties of the distributed cortical activity related to mental rotation processes at high temporal resolution by means of brain magnetic field measurements and a linear inversion algorithm. Distributed neural activities during the mental rotation and control tasks were estimated for six subjects, and the differences in the activity distribution were analyzed. Statistically significant differences in the parietal and lateral posterior temporal region were detected 200-300 ms after the visual stimulus, indicating that the dorsal and ventral pathway were included in the mental image processing.