Bursting patterns of neurons in the cat's visual cortex

We found a distinct group of simple and complex cells in cat visual cortex which responded to a moving stimulus in a rhythmic or nonrhythmic series of spike bursts. Each burst consisted of 2-12 spikes and 5-40 bursts were produced at each sweep. The regularity of the interburst intervals of rhythmic neurons depends on the velocity direction and orientation of the stimulus movement. From the single sweeps obtained for these neurons and their average response histograms, a further subdivision of the excitatory area of the receptive field is suggested.