Abstract
Real-time rendering of closed-loop visual environments is important for next-generation understanding of brain function and behaviour, but is often prohibitively difficult for non-experts to implement and is limited to few laboratories worldwide. We developed BonVision as an easy-to-use open-source software for the display of virtual or augmented reality, as well as standard visual stimuli. BonVision has been tested on humans and mice, and is capable of supporting new experimental designs in other animal models of vision. As the architecture is based on the open-source Bonsai graphical programming language, BonVision benefits from native integration with experimental hardware. BonVision therefore enables easy implementation of closed-loop experiments, including real-time interaction with deep neural networks, and communication with behavioural and physiological measurement and manipulation devices.
Highlights
Understanding behaviour and its underlying neural mechanisms calls for the ability to construct and control environments that immerse animals, including humans, in complex naturalistic environments that are responsive to their actions
A display device becomes a window into the virtual environment, where each pixel on the display specifies a vector from the observer through that window
BonVision includes a library of workflows and operators to standardise and ease the construction of new stimuli and virtual environments
Summary
Understanding behaviour and its underlying neural mechanisms calls for the ability to construct and control environments that immerse animals, including humans, in complex naturalistic environments that are responsive to their actions. Pioneering efforts to bring gaming-driven advances to neuroscience research have provided new platforms for closed-loop visual stimulus generation: STYTRA (Stowers et al, 2017) provides 2D visual stimuli for larval zebrafish in python, ratCAVE (Del Grosso and Sirota, 2019) is a specialised augmented reality system for rodents in python, FreemoVR (Aronov and Tank, 2014) provides virtual reality in Ubuntu/Linux, and ViRMEn (Stih et al, 2019) provides virtual reality in Matlab These new platforms lack the generalised frameworks needed to specify or present standard visual stimuli
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
