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Stimulus onset quenches neural variability: a widespread cortical phenomenon.

ABSTRACT: Neural responses are typically characterized by computing the mean firing rate, but response variability can exist across trials. Many studies have examined the effect of a stimulus on the mean response, but few have examined the effect on response variability. We measured neural variability in 13 extracellularly recorded datasets and one intracellularly recorded dataset from seven areas spanning the four cortical lobes in monkeys and cats. In every case, stimulus onset caused a decline in neural variability. This occurred even when the stimulus produced little change in mean firing rate. The variability decline was observed in membrane potential recordings, in the spiking of individual neurons and in correlated spiking variability measured with implanted 96-electrode arrays. The variability decline was observed for all stimuli tested, regardless of whether the animal was awake, behaving or anaesthetized. This widespread variability decline suggests a rather general property of cortex, that its state is stabilized by an input.

SUBMITTER: Churchland MM

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2828350 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Stimulus onset quenches neural variability: a widespread cortical phenomenon.

Churchland Mark M MM Yu Byron M BM Cunningham John P JP Sugrue Leo P LP Cohen Marlene R MR Corrado Greg S GS Newsome William T WT Clark Andrew M AM Hosseini Paymon P Scott Benjamin B BB Bradley David C DC Smith Matthew A MA Kohn Adam A Movshon J Anthony JA Armstrong Katherine M KM Moore Tirin T Chang Steve W SW Snyder Lawrence H LH Lisberger Stephen G SG Priebe Nicholas J NJ Finn Ian M IM Ferster David D Ryu Stephen I SI Santhanam Gopal G Sahani Maneesh M Shenoy Krishna V KV

Nature neuroscience 20100221 3

Neural responses are typically characterized by computing the mean firing rate, but response variability can exist across trials. Many studies have examined the effect of a stimulus on the mean response, but few have examined the effect on response variability. We measured neural variability in 13 extracellularly recorded datasets and one intracellularly recorded dataset from seven areas spanning the four cortical lobes in monkeys and cats. In every case, stimulus onset caused a decline in neura ...[more]

PMID: 20173745

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Project description:BackgroundAcute alcohol intoxication has wide-ranging neurobehavioral effects on psychomotor, attentional, inhibitory, and memory-related cognitive processes. These effects are mirrored in disruption of neural metabolism, functional activation, and functional network coherence. Metrics of intraregional neural dynamics such as regional signal variability (RSV) and brain entropy (BEN) may capture unique aspects of neural functional capacity in healthy and clinical populations; however, alcohol's influence on these metrics is unclear. The present study aimed to elucidate the influence of acute alcohol intoxication on RSV and to clarify these effects with subsequent BEN analyses.Methods26 healthy adults between 25 and 45 years of age (65.4% women) participated in 2 counterbalanced sessions. In one, participants consumed a beverage containing alcohol sufficient to produce a breath alcohol concentration of 0.08 g/dl. In the other, they consumed a placebo beverage. Approximately 35 minutes after beverage consumption, participants completed a 9-minute resting-state fMRI scan. Whole-brain, voxel-wise standard deviation was used to assess RSV, which was compared between sessions. Within clusters displaying alterations in RSV, sample entropy was calculated to assess BEN.ResultsCompared to the placebo, alcohol intake resulted in widespread reductions in RSV in the bilateral middle frontal, right inferior frontal, right superior frontal, bilateral posterior cingulate, bilateral middle temporal, right supramarginal gyri, and bilateral inferior parietal lobule. Within these clusters, significant reductions in BEN were found in the bilateral middle frontal and right superior frontal gyri. No effects were noted in subcortical or cerebellar areas.ConclusionsFindings indicate that alcohol intake produces diffuse reductions in RSV among structures associated with attentional processes. Within these structures, signal complexity was also reduced in a subset of frontal regions. Neurobehavioral effects of acute alcohol consumption may be partially driven by disruption of intraregional neural dynamics among regions involved in higher-order cognitive and attentional processes.

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Stimulus onset quenches neural variability: a widespread cortical phenomenon.

Publications

Stimulus onset quenches neural variability: a widespread cortical phenomenon.

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