Recordings were made from units of the ventro-basal complex of the thalamus. Anaesthetized cats were stimulated by shocks to peripheral nerves and to somatosensory cortical points. Cortico-fugal facilitation appeared as reduced latency and increased probability of unit discharge. The effect was frequency dependent, 10–20/sec being optimal. It started about 1 msec after the cortical stimulus and lasted for 6–25 msec, dependent on the tetanus duration. Similar results are reported for the control of the medial geniculate body by auditory cortex.
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Andersen et al. (2008) studied this question.