Ultrarapid decision-making in an avian brain.

Carrion crows (Corvus corone) make accurate visual motion discrimination decisions with choices reported in about 235 milliseconds on average.

• Why it matters: Perceptual decision-making is well studied in mammals, but how it operates in other vertebrates remains unclear, especially regarding speed without accuracy loss.
• What they did: The authors trained carrion crows in a classic visual motion discrimination task and recorded pallial endbrain activity, finding direction-selective neurons encode upcoming choice about 70 milliseconds after stimulus onset.
• The result: Neural ramping scaled with sensory evidence and converged at response onset, implying avian decision circuitry can support ultrarapid, accurate visuomotor control.