Evidence map›Paper›PMID 24082087›Full record

Trial reportProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2013

Spatial and temporal codes mediate the tactile perception of natural textures.

Alison I Weber, Hannes P Saal, Justin D Lieber, Ju-Wen Cheng, Louise R Manfredi, John F Dammann, Sliman J Bensmaia

Abstract readClinical Trial
In one paragraph

Trial report in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 149 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
149citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

149 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Article
  3. Article
  4. Article
  5. Article
  6. Spinal Processing of Spatiotemporally Diverse Tactile Stimuli: Computational Insights into Allodynia and Spinal Cord Stimulation.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2026
    Article
  7. Article
  8. Review
  9. Article
  10. Article
  11. Article
  12. Article
  13. Vibroacoustic signatures: proof of concept for simple material characterization during needle interventions.International journal of computer assisted radiology and surgery · 2025
    Article
  14. Article
  15. Article
  16. Article
  17. Article
  18. Article
  19. Article
  20. Encoding of Vibrotactile Stimuli by Mechanoreceptors in Rodent Glabrous Skin.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2024
    Article

89 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

7 authors.

Alison I WeberDepartment of Organismal Biology and Anatomy and Committee on Computational Neuroscience, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637.
Hannes P Saal
Justin D Lieber
Ju-Wen Cheng
Louise R Manfredi
John F Dammann
Sliman J Bensmaia

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

When we run our fingers over the surface of an object, we acquire information about its microgeometry and material properties. Texture information is widely believed to be conveyed in spatial patterns of activation evoked across one of three populations of cutaneous mechanoreceptive afferents that innervate the fingertips. Here, we record the responses evoked in individual cutaneous afferents in Rhesus macaques as we scan a diverse set of natural textures across their fingertips using a custom-made rotating drum stimulator. We show that a spatial mechanism can only account for the processing of coarse textures. Information about most natural textures, however, is conveyed through precise temporal spiking patterns in afferent responses, driven by high-frequency skin vibrations elicited during scanning. Furthermore, these texture-specific spiking patterns predictably dilate or contract in time with changes in scanning speed; the systematic effect of speed on neuronal activity suggests that it can be reversed to achieve perceptual constancy across speeds. The proposed temporal coding mechanism involves converting the fine spatial structure of the surface into a temporal spiking pattern, shaped in part by the mechanical properties of the skin, and ascribes an additional function to vibration-sensitive mechanoreceptive afferents. This temporal mechanism complements the spatial one and greatly extends the range of tangible textures. We show that a combination of spatial and temporal mechanisms, mediated by all three populations of afferents, accounts for perceptual judgments of texture.

Indexed as

AdolescentAdultAnimalsFemaleFingersHumansMacaca mulattaMaleSkinSurface PropertiesSynaptic TransmissionTouch PerceptionVibrationneurophysiologypsychophysicsroughnessspike timingtouch

Identifiers

PMID24082087
PMCPMC3800989

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.