Work

Dendritic Discrimination of Temporal Input Sequences in Cortical Neurons

Year: 2010

Type: article

Abstract: The detection and discrimination of temporal sequences is fundamental to brain function and underlies perception, cognition, and motor output. By applying patterned, two-photon glutamate uncaging, we found that single dendrites of cortical pyramidal neurons exhibit sensitivity to the sequence of synaptic activation. This sensitivity is encoded by both local dendritic calcium signals and somatic depolarization, leading to sequence-selective spike output. The mechanism involves dendritic impedance gradients and nonlinear synaptic N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor activation and is generalizable to dendrites in different neuronal types. This enables discrimination of patterns delivered to a single dendrite, as well as patterns distributed randomly across the dendritic tree. Pyramidal cell dendrites can thus act as processing compartments for the detection of synaptic sequences, thereby implementing a fundamental cortical computation.

Source: Science

DOI: 10.1126/science.1189664

Authors: Tiago Branco, Beverley A. Clark, Michael Häusser

Institution: University College London

Language: English

Topic: Neuroscience and Neuropharmacology Research

Subfield: Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience

Field: Neuroscience

Domain: Life Sciences

Open Access status: green

Funder: Wellcome Trust

Award: Experimental and theoretical characterization of synaptic efficacy in mammalian central neurons.