What resolves this contention: Lapper & Bolam (1992) at EM level concluded that…

What resolves this contention: Lapper & Bolam (1992) at EM level concluded that cortical and parafascicular thalamic afferents largely target different MSN populations (cortical onto spines of densely-spiny MSNs; thalamic onto dendritic shafts of less-spiny cells). Ding et al. (2010) functionally demonstrate cortical and thalamic convergence on identified striatonigral and striatopallidal MSNs and that thalamic input modulates cortical drive to both classes via cholinergic interneurons. The conflict concerns whether thalamostriatal input from the parafascicular nucleus terminates predominantly on a non-MSN/interneuron population vs convergently on the same MSNs that receive cortical input. / It is concluded that although afferents from the somatosensory cortex and from the parafascicular nucleus converge upon the same part of the neostriatum, they probably do not converge upon the same spiny neurons. / This patterned