Abstract
Paired stimulation has been applied to modulate neuronal functions in the primary somatosensory cortex but its utility in the alternation of tuning function, such as direction tuning for whisker stimuli, remains unclear. In the present study, we attempted to manipulate feature preferences in barrel cortical neurons using repetitive paired whisker deflection combined with optogenetic stimulation and to obtain optimal parameters that can induce neuroplasticity. We found no significant response changes across stimulus parameters, such as onset asynchronies and paired directions. Only when paired stimulation was applied in the nonpreferred direction of the principal whisker of a neuron, were the neuron’s responses enhanced in that direction. Importantly, this effect was only observed when the optogenetic stimulus preceded the mechanical stimulus. Our findings indicate that repetitive paired optogenetic-mechanical stimulation can induce in vivo neuroplasticity of feature selectivity in limited situations.
Highlights
The induced neuroplasticity of sensory function using repetitive paired stimulation has been observed in the brain
The results showed that Change Index (CI) were not altered in any of the relative direction conditions in the principal whisker (PW)-only or adjacent whisker (AW)-only group (p-value from 0.033–0.947, Wilcoxon signed-rank test, Bonferroni correction; Figures 6A,B, Table 4), or the optogenetic-only group (n = 18, p-value from 0.071 to 0.879 in all conditions; Figure 6C)
The present study indicates that feature selectivity could be altered by activity-dependent modulation using a specific paired stimulation protocol
Summary
The induced neuroplasticity of sensory function using repetitive paired stimulation has been observed in the brain. Rodent’s primary somatosensory cortex barrel field (S1BF) is a feasible model for studying stimulus-induced neuroplasticity because of its familiar anatomical and functional organization (Woolsey and Van der Loos, 1970; Van der Loos and Woolsey, 1973; Armstrong-James et al, 1992; Petersen, 2007; Feldmeyer, 2012; Feldmeyer et al, 2013; Adibi, 2019; Petersen, 2019; Staiger and Petersen, 2021), properties of angular tuning (Bruno et al, 2003; Andermann and Moore, 2006; Li and Ebner, 2007; Tsytsarev et al, 2010; Kwon et al, 2018), and experimental convenience. The whisker-barrel system is characterized by its one-to-one topographic relationship and is widely used in the evaluation of functional plasticity (Katz et al, 2006; Heiss et al, 2008; Jacob et al, 2012, 2017) and whisker-map reorganization (Van der Loos and Woolsey, 1973; Fox, 2002; Petersen et al, 2003; Feldman and Brecht, 2005; Feldmeyer et al, 2013; Adibi, 2019; Petersen, 2019)
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