Sample entropy analysis of local field potential in generalized flash suppression

Generalized flash suppression (GFS) is a visual illusion that produce perceptual suppression despite constant retinal input, which thereby provides a rare opportunity to study neural mechanisms directly related to perception. Previous study has shown that local field potential (LFP) reflects perceptual suppression in monkey visual cortex with linear analysis techniques. Yet, considering the fundamentally nonlinear nature of neural dynamics, we set forth to study the LFP difference of perceptual suppression with a nonlinear method. Specifically, we apply sample entropy to quantify the complexity of LFP activity. Our results showed that with sample entropy, the neural activity in visual area V1 revealed significantly perception-related changes. The higher entropy of LFP in the invisible condition indicates that neurons may produce more complex patterns to induce perceptual suppression.