Representation of pitch chroma by multi-peak spectral tuning in human auditory cortex.

ABSTRACT: Musical notes played at octave intervals (i.e., having the same pitch chroma) are perceived as similar. This well-known perceptual phenomenon lays at the foundation of melody recognition and music perception, yet its neural underpinnings remain largely unknown to date. Using fMRI with high sensitivity and spatial resolution, we examined the contribution of multi-peak spectral tuning to the neural representation of pitch chroma in human auditory cortex in two experiments. In experiment 1, our estimation of population spectral tuning curves from the responses to natural sounds confirmed--with new data--our recent results on the existence of cortical ensemble responses finely tuned to multiple frequencies at one octave distance (Moerel et al., 2013). In experiment 2, we fitted a mathematical

SUBMITTER: Moerel M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4388253 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature