Abstract
This article presents novel networks that demonstrate how neurons can be connected to process information. The networks perform the same functions as standard electronic logic circuits, but they have different architectures because a neuron’s logic capability is different from the logic gates commonly used in electronic computational systems. With only the capabilities of neuron excitation and inhibition, the networks generate detailed phenomena of short-term memory and electroencephalograms. A single neuron can operate as a functionally complete logic primitive. As few as two neurons can be connected to form a robust flip-flop. Neurons in a memory bank of flip-flops produce the seven characteristics of neuron activity that are associated with memory formation, retention, retrieval, termination, and errors. Neural flip-flops also predict seven more phenomena that are testable by the same methods that led to the discovery of the first seven. Three neurons can form an oscillator, and basic flip-flops can function as toggles. With input from an oscillator, a toggle oscillates at half the frequency of the input. A cascade consisting of an oscillator and four toggles connected in sequence can produce the synchronized firing found in electroencephalograms by enabling neural structures to change states simultaneously. The means and variances of five EEG frequency bands are given as explicit functions of the mean and variance of the neuron delay times in all such cascades’ initial oscillators. The delay times’ two parameters determine the specific frequencies that separate the EEG bands and the peak frequency within each band.
Cascaded oscillators determine the octave relationships between the bands’ boundaries and peaks, and they suggest selective advantages for synchronization and for synchronization in different frequency bands. A simple experiment is described to test for the predicted relationship between the distribution parameters of neuron delay times and EEG frequencies. Any of the networks can be constructed with neurons and tested for many predicted behaviors.