The role of patterned activity in neuronal codes for behavior

模式活动在行为神经元代码中的作用

• 批准号: 8827131
• 负责人: John H.R. Maunsell
• 金额: $ 91.05万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2014-09-30 至 2017-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/8827131
• 关键词: Action Potentials; Address; Affect; Anatomy; Animal Behavior; Animal Model; Animals; Area; Autistic Disorder; Behavior; Behavior Control; Behavioral; Behavioral Assay; Biological Models; Brain; Calcium Signaling; Cells; Cerebral cortex; Code; Collaborations; Complex; Data Collection; Development; Disease; Fire - disasters; Genetic; Goals; Health; Human; Image; Individual; Lasers; Light; Link; Measurement; Measures; Mental Depression; Mental Health; Methods; Microscope; Morphology; Mus; Neurons; Optics; Pathology; Pattern; Perception; Performance; Photons; Population; Psyche structure; Psychophysics; Reporting; Research; Role; Schizophrenia; Sensory; Shapes; Signal Transduction; Spatial Distribution; Specificity; Stimulus; Structure; Synapses; Techniques; Testing; Theoretical Studies; Time; Training; Validation; Visual; Visual Cortex; Visual system structure; Work; behavior measurement; in vivo; insight; mind control; neuronal patterning; new technology; optogenetics; public health relevance; research study; response; scale up; sensory stimulus; two-photon; visual stimulus

 DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): A key aspect of brain function is how the activity of neuronal populations encodes information that is used to guide behavior. A longstanding model system to understand population coding is the visual cerebral cortex, because its structure and anatomy are well understood, and because visual stimuli can be presented to subjects with high levels of temporal and spatial control. Thousands or more neurons fire action potentials in response to a single visual stimulus, and an important open question is how this population response carries information - how the detailed timing and pattern of these spikes across neurons is decoded to guide behavior. Because it is known that genetics controls the identity and morphology of neurons, and influences which other neurons they form synaptic partners with, it appears likely that the precise details of which neurons in a population fire spikes is vitally important for behavior. But surprisingly, past experimental work hints that the primary quantity governing neuronal coding is the total number of spikes or average firing rate across a population, making the precise timing and spatial distribution of those spikes less important. Theoretical work shows that either type of code can be supported by the cortex and that the type of code used may even vary from one behavioral task to the next. However, it has not been possible to definitively determine how cortical population codes are used for behavior because of the inability to change the activity of neurons in a patterned fashion. In this project, we will use two-photon ontogenetic stimulation to activate patterns of neurons in behaving animals to understand the details of how population codes control behavior. This work is made possible by the combination of optical wave front-shaping methods to control the size and shape of a two- photon optical focal volume, and psychophysical behavioral methods in mice that allow precise quantification of animals' perceptual performance when neuronal patterns are stimulated. We will use two-photon patterned stimulation to replay naturally-occurring population responses to determine if they have special meaning to the animal, perhaps because those patterns are determined by essential synaptic connections. By using patterned stimulation to vary the activity correlation between neurons, we will also test whether previously-observed pairwise correlations, which measure the relationship between the firing activities of two neurons, are an important part of the neuronal code. In achieving our goals we will produce a new technology for stimulating neurons in the brains of behaving animals with single-cell specificity that can be adapted to explore neuronal dynamics in a wide range of animal models and behaviors.

 描述（由申请人提供）：大脑功能的一个关键方面是神经元群体的活动如何编码用于指导行为的信息。理解群体编码的一个长期模型系统是视觉大脑皮质，因为它的结构和解剖结构已经得到了很好的理解，并且因为视觉刺激可以呈现给具有高水平时间和空间控制的受试者。数千个或更多的神经元对单一的视觉刺激做出反应，激发动作电位，一个重要的开放性问题是这种群体反应如何携带信息-如何解码这些神经元尖峰的详细时间和模式以指导行为。因为我们知道遗传学控制着神经元的身份和形态，并影响着它们与哪些其他神经元形成突触伙伴，所以群体中哪些神经元发出尖峰的精确细节对行为至关重要。但令人惊讶的是，过去的实验工作暗示，控制神经元编码的主要数量是整个群体中的尖峰总数或平均放电率，使得这些尖峰的精确时间和空间分布不那么重要。理论研究表明，任何一种类型的代码都可以由皮层支持，并且所使用的代码类型甚至可以从一个行为任务到下一个行为任务而变化。然而，由于无法以模式化的方式改变神经元的活动，因此还不可能明确地确定皮层群体代码如何用于行为。在这个项目中，我们将 使用双光子个体发育刺激来激活行为动物的神经元模式，以了解种群代码如何控制行为的细节。这项工作通过控制双光子光学聚焦体积的大小和形状的光学波前成形方法与小鼠中的心理物理行为方法的组合而成为可能，所述心理物理行为方法允许在神经元模式被刺激时精确量化动物的感知表现。我们将使用双光子模式刺激来重放自然发生的群体反应，以确定它们是否对动物有特殊意义，也许是因为这些模式是由基本的突触连接决定的。通过使用模式化刺激来改变神经元之间的活动相关性，我们还将测试先前观察到的成对相关性（测量两个神经元的放电活动之间的关系）是否是神经元代码的重要组成部分。为了实现我们的目标，我们将开发一种新技术，用于刺激具有单细胞特异性的行为动物大脑中的神经元，这种技术可以适用于探索各种动物模型和行为中的神经元动力学。