Contrast polarity-specific mapping improves efficiency of neuronal computation for collision detection.

ABSTRACT: Neurons receive information through their synaptic inputs, but the functional significance of how those inputs are mapped on to a cell's dendrites remains unclear. We studied this question in a grasshopper visual neuron that tracks approaching objects and triggers escape behavior before an impending collision. In response to black approaching objects, the neuron receives OFF excitatory inputs that form a retinotopic map of the visual field onto compartmentalized, distal dendrites. Subsequent processing of these OFF inputs by active membrane conductances allows the neuron to discriminate the spatial coherence of such stimuli. In contrast, we show that ON excitatory synaptic inputs activated by white approaching objects map in a random manner onto a more proximal dendritic field of the same

SUBMITTER: Dewell RB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9674337 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature