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Serotonin increases population coding of behaviorally relevant stimuli by enhancing responses of ON but not OFF-type sensory neurons.

ABSTRACT: How neural populations encode sensory input to generate behavioral responses remains a central problem in systems neuroscience. Here we investigated how neuromodulation influences population coding of behaviorally relevant stimuli to give rise to behavior in the electrosensory system of the weakly electric fish Apteronotus leptorhynchus. We performed multi-unit recordings from ON and OFF sensory pyramidal cells in response to stimuli whose amplitude (i.e., envelope) varied in time, before and after electrical stimulation of the raphe nuclei. Overall, raphe stimulation increased population coding by ON- but not by OFF-type cells, despite both cell types showing similar sensitivities to the stimulus at the single neuron level. Surprisingly, only changes in population coding by ON-type cells were correlated with changes in behavioral responses. Taken together, our results show that neuromodulation differentially affects ON vs. OFF-type cells in order to enhance perception of behaviorally relevant sensory input.

SUBMITTER: Marquez MM

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10395545 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Serotonin increases population coding of behaviorally relevant stimuli by enhancing responses of ON but not OFF-type sensory neurons.

Marquez Mariana M MM Chacron Maurice J MJ

Heliyon 20230714 7

How neural populations encode sensory input to generate behavioral responses remains a central problem in systems neuroscience. Here we investigated how neuromodulation influences population coding of behaviorally relevant stimuli to give rise to behavior in the electrosensory system of the weakly electric fish <i>Apteronotus leptorhynchus</i>. We performed multi-unit recordings from ON and OFF sensory pyramidal cells in response to stimuli whose amplitude (i.e., envelope) varied in time, before ...[more]

PMID: 37539191

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Dataset Information

Serotonin increases population coding of behaviorally relevant stimuli by enhancing responses of ON but not OFF-type sensory neurons.

Publications

Serotonin increases population coding of behaviorally relevant stimuli by enhancing responses of ON but not OFF-type sensory neurons.

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