Cell Assembly Dynamics of Sparsely-Connected Inhibitory Networks: A Simple Model for the Collective Activity of Striatal Projection Neurons.

ABSTRACT: Striatal projection neurons form a sparsely-connected inhibitory network, and this arrangement may be essential for the appropriate temporal organization of behavior. Here we show that a simplified, sparse inhibitory network of Leaky-Integrate-and-Fire neurons can reproduce some key features of striatal population activity, as observed in brain slices. In particular we develop a new metric to determine the conditions under which sparse inhibitory networks form anti-correlated cell assemblies with time-varying activity of individual cells. We find that under these conditions the network displays an input-specific sequence of cell assembly switching, that effectively discriminates similar inputs. Our results support the proposal that GABAergic connections between striatal projection neurons

SUBMITTER: Angulo-Garcia D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4767417 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature