PRIN 2017 – From brain dynamics to restoration of visual awareness after damage to the visual cortex

OBIETTIVI:
Visual awareness – the online access to the content of our visual experience – affords flexibility and experiential richness, and its loss following brain damage has devastating effects. However, patients with blindness following damage to the visual cortex (V1) may retain non-conscious visual functions, despite visual awareness is lacking. The overarching goal of the present project is to translate these nonconscious visual abilities into conscious one. This requires moving the research agenda from the current study of the neural correlates of visual awareness to the neural causes determining it. To achieve this translational objective, we propose to integrate into a coherent framework three main properties of visual processing: topological, dynamic and oscillatory characteristics. In doing so, we will place our understanding of visual awareness on firm neuropsychological and empirical bases. Next, we will translate this wisdom into evidence-based clinical intervention.