Learning Enhances Sensory and Multiple Non-sensory Representations in Primary Visual Cortex.

ABSTRACT: We determined how learning modifies neural representations in primary visual cortex (V1) during acquisition of a visually guided behavioral task. We imaged the activity of the same layer 2/3 neuronal populations as mice learned to discriminate two visual patterns while running through a virtual corridor, where one pattern was rewarded. Improvements in behavioral performance were closely associated with increasingly distinguishable population-level representations of task-relevant stimuli, as a result of stabilization of existing and recruitment of new neurons selective for these stimuli. These effects correlated with the appearance of multiple task-dependent signals during learning: those that increased neuronal selectivity across the population when expert animals engaged in the task, and

SUBMITTER: Poort J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4503798 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature