Investigation of the functional role of adult hippocampal neurogenesis in a neural network model

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The hippocampus is a brain structure that is important for episodic memory and for navigation. It is special in that it produces new neurons throughout life in a substructure called dentate gyrus. In earlier work we have proposed a functional hypotheses for the new neurons and have illustrated it with a simple network model. Our proposed project is based on this work and has three main aims. First, we will extend our existing abstract model to include prominent anatomical and physiological features of the hippocampus. This will allow us to quantify the computational advantages of neurogenesis rather than simply show its benefit qualitatively. Second, we will make detailed experimental comparisons to test our model as well as making new experimentally testable predictions on, for example, the time course of neurogenesis in animals subjected to different rearing conditions. This will involve continuation of our fruitful collaboration with the experimental lab of Gerd Kempermann. Third, we will extend our functional analysis of hippocampal neurogenesis to consider the wider implications in areas downstream of the dentate gyrus, such as CA1 and CA3, areas which we have left implicit up until now. Finally, in a potential third year we plan to take a novel evolutionary approach and create from our model a set of increasingly simplified versions that trace back the evolutionary development of the hippocampus. Comparing the different models shall allow us to justify each component of the model.