The model of ocular dominance pattern formation in the presence of gradients of chemical labels.

Abstract

Event Abstract Back to Event The model of ocular dominance pattern formation in the presence of gradients of chemical labels. Dmitry Tsigankov1, 2* and Alexei Koulakov3 1 Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience, Germany 2 Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-organization, Germany 3 Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, United States The formation of ocular dominance (OD) columns in the mammalian visual cortex is thought to be driven by electrical activity of the projecting neurons. Indeed, theoretical modeling have shown that lateral cortical activity-dependent interactions are capable of producing such a periodic pattern of regions dominated by inputs from left or right eye. This scenario for OD pattern formation based on self-organization of inputs due to excitatory and inhibitory lateral interactions of Mexican-hat shape was recently confronted by several lines of experimental observations. First, the anatomical data on primary visual cortex indicate that the inhibition can have a shorter range than excitation, the regime in which the classical model fails to produce OD structure. Second, the measurements of the width of OD regions following the manipulations with the strength of the inhibitory connections are inconsistent with the predictions of the model. When the strength of inhibitory connections is increased the OD width is found to increase and when inhibition is decreased the OD width also decreases. This behavior is opposite to one predicted by the classical model. Finally, the sole role of activity-dependent self-organization in the formation of OD structure was questioned as it was observed that OD patterns can be formed in optic tectum in the presence of other factors such as gradients of interacting chemical labels.Here we present theoretical analysis of the possible interplay between genetically encoded labeling and experience-driven reorganization of the projections in the formation of OD patterns. We show that in the presence of single gradient of chemical marker the projections from two eyes are segregated into OD columns for a wide class of lateral interaction profiles. We obtain that depending on the range and strength of inhibitory and excitatory lateral connections the projecting neurons may prefer to form segregated or mixed inputs. We find the regimes when OD structure emerges for short-range inhibition and long-range excitation. We also investigate the role of lateral inhibition and excitation for different interaction profiles to find a novel regime when increase in the inhibition strength increases the width of OD columns in agreement with the experiment. Conference: Bernstein Conference on Computational Neuroscience, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, 30 Sep - 2 Oct, 2009. Presentation Type: Poster Presentation Topic: Learning and plasticity Citation: Tsigankov D and Koulakov A (2009). The model of ocular dominance pattern formation in the presence of gradients of chemical labels.. Front. Comput. Neurosci. Conference Abstract: Bernstein Conference on Computational Neuroscience. doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.10.2009.14.146 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 28 Aug 2009; Published Online: 28 Aug 2009. * Correspondence: Dmitry Tsigankov, Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience, Göttingen, Germany, dmitry@nld.ds.mpg.de Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Dmitry Tsigankov Alexei Koulakov Google Dmitry Tsigankov Alexei Koulakov Google Scholar Dmitry Tsigankov Alexei Koulakov PubMed Dmitry Tsigankov Alexei Koulakov Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.