Maturation of GABAergic inhibition promotes strengthening of temporally coherent inputs among convergent pathways.

ABSTRACT: Spike-timing-dependent plasticity (STDP), a form of Hebbian plasticity, is inherently stabilizing. Whether and how GABAergic inhibition influences STDP is not well understood. Using a model neuron driven by converging inputs modifiable by STDP, we determined that a sufficient level of inhibition was critical to ensure that temporal coherence (correlation among presynaptic spike times) of synaptic inputs, rather than initial strength or number of inputs within a pathway, controlled postsynaptic spike timing. Inhibition exerted this effect by preferentially reducing synaptic efficacy, the ability of inputs to evoke postsynaptic action potentials, of the less coherent inputs. In visual cortical slices, inhibition potently reduced synaptic efficacy at ages during but not before the critical pe

SUBMITTER: Kuhlman SJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2880567 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature