Temporal binding of non-uniform objects

Gestalt-based feature binding becomes problematic if different objects overlap in their positional configuration and/or feature space, or if features vary over the spatial extent of an object. If synchronization is to be a viable mechanism for binding the responses of disparate feature selective neurons in the brain, it must cope with resulting ambiguities. In this article the synchronization properties of an oscillator network for multidimensional feature binding are investigated. For non-uniform feature distributions in a stimulus, its components are adequately represented by the eigenmodes of the oscillatory dynamics. The significance of the eigenmodes corresponds to the salience of different stimulus interpretations. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.