Primate

About: Primate is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 1250 publications have been published within this topic receiving 67388 citations. The topic is also known as: the primate order & primates.

Herpesvirus saimiri and Herpesvirus ateles

Abstract: Herpesvirus saimiri (H. saimiri) is a ubiquitous agent of squirrel monkeys (Saimiri sciureus), a primate species native to the South American rain forests. The virus can easily be isolated from blood and tissue-culture cells of most healthy squirrel monkeys, and there is no evidence so far that H. saimiri is pathogenic in its natural host. After the first report on isolation of H. saimiri from primary kidney-cell cultures by Melendez et al. (1968) from the New England Primate Research Center, the virus was regarded as a harmless indigenous agent of squirrel monkeys. The interest in this virus arose from the observation that H. saimiri is extremely oncogenic in a number of other primate species that are presumably not infected under usual wildlife conditions (Melendez et al., 1969b). Marmoset monkeys of the genus Saguinus consistently develop malignant tumors of the lymphatic system, usually within 2 months of infection. The ability to induce neoplastic disease rapidly and reproducibly has made this system attractive for investigation of the biological, immunological, and molecular parameters of Cell transformation and tumor induction.

Smooth eye movements elicited by microstimulation in the primate frontal eye field

Abstract: 1. We electrically stimulated the macaque monkey's frontal eye field (FEF) region to localize and to analyze the smooth pursuit eye movement representation. Rhesus monkeys were trained to fixate st...

The topography of primate retina: a study of the human, bushbaby, and new- and old-world monkeys.

Abstract: The distribution of ganglion cells has been studied in the retinas of four primates: the prosimian bushbaby, the New-World squirrel monkey, the Old-World crab-eating cynamolgous monkey, and the human. The sizes of ganglion cell somas were also measured at a number of retinal locations and compared with similar measurements in the cat retina to test for the presence in primates of retinal specializations such as the visual streak, and for gradients in retinal structure, such as that between temporal and nasal retina. In all four primates, ganglion cell somas in peripheral retina ranged considerably in diameter (6-16 micrometer in the bushbaby, 8-22 micrometer in the squirrel monkey, 8-23 micrometer in the cynamolgous monkey, 8-26 micrometer in the human). It seems likely that the strong physiological correlates of soma size which have been described among cat retinal ganglion cells and among the relay cells of the macaque lateral geniculate nucleus are generally present in primates. In all four primates, evidence was also obtained of a visual streak specialization; the isodensity lines in ganglion cell density maps were horizontally elongated, and small-bodied ganglion cells were relatively more common in the region of the proposed streak than in other areas of peripheral retina. However, the visual streak seems less well developed than in the cat; among the four primate species examined it was best developed in the bushbaby, at least as assessed by the shape of the isodensity lines. All four primates showed a clear foveal specialization, but this feature seemed least developed in the bushbaby. At the fovea, ganglion cells are smaller in soma size than in peripheral retina; they also seemed more uniform in size, although some distinctly larger cells persist in the human and bushbaby. Soma size measurements also provided evidence of a difference between nasal and temporal areas of peripheral retina comparable to that reported for the cat and other species. Thus the primate retinas examined show features, such as the foveal specialization, which seem unique to them among mammals. They also show features, such as nasal-temporal differences in ganglion cell size, and (though weakly developed) a visual streak, which they have in common with other mammals with widely different phylogenetic histories.

Functional specialization within the dorsolateral frontal cortex for serial order memory.

Abstract: Monkeys with lesions restricted to two anatomically distinct regions of the dorsolateral frontal cortex were tested on a novel task that was developed to assess memory for the order of occurrence of stimuli. Monkeys with bilateral lesions of the mid-dorsolateral frontal cortex (cytoarchitectonic areas 46 and 9) were severely impaired, whereas monkeys with lesions of the posterior region of the dorsolateral frontal cortex (area 8 and rostral area 6) performed as well as the normal control animals. These results show that the primate mid-dorsolateral frontal cortex is a critical component of a neural circuit underlying the monitoring of the serial order of stimuli.