Columnar organization of visually driven neurons in the superior colliculus of the cat.

The majority of microelectrode penetrations showed regular vertical arrangement of visually driven neurons. In 10 percent of penetrations, direction sensitivity of neurons, the responses to diffuse light and moving stimuli end the position of receptive fields were practically identical. In 70 percent of penetrations, neurons were similar in one or two of these respects. It is concluded that the vertical organization of neurons may be an elementary unit of collicular function.