Acquisition of non-olfactory encoding improves odour discrimination in olfactory cortex.

ABSTRACT: Olfaction is influenced by contextual factors, past experiences, and the animal's internal state. Whether this information is integrated at the initial stages of cortical odour processing is not known, nor how these signals may influence odour encoding. Here we revealed multiple and diverse non-olfactory responses in the primary olfactory (piriform) cortex (PCx), which dynamically enhance PCx odour discrimination according to behavioural demands. We performed recordings of PCx neurons from mice trained in a virtual reality task to associate odours with visual contexts to obtain a reward. We found that learning shifts PCx activity from encoding solely odours to a regime in which positional, contextual, and associative responses emerge on odour-responsive neurons that become mixed-selective.

SUBMITTER: Federman N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11220071 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature