Affiliations: [a] Institute of Biomedical Engineering, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada | [b] Department of Ophthalmology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada | [c] Department of Neurology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada | [d] Department of Otolaryngology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada | [e] Eye Research Institute of Canada, Toronto, Canada
Note: [*] Reprint address: Robert S. Allison, Centre for Vision Research, York University, 103 Farquharson, North York, ON M3J 1P3 Canada. Tel: (416) 736-5659; E-mail: allison@hpl.ists.ca.
Abstract: The response of the vestibulo-ocular reflex following unilateral vestibular deafferentation by gentamicin ablation was studied using transient stimuli. The response to these rapid passive head turns showed a strong asymmetry with permanent, reduced gains toward the side of lesion. These gain reductions have large variation (gains of 0.26 to 0.83), which may result from preferential sparing of regularly firing afferent fibers following gentamicin ablation. Based on the size and nature of the nonlinearity, an explanation based on Ewald’s second law was discounted.
