RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Neural oscillations as a signature of efficient coding in the presence of synaptic delays
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 034736
DO 10.1101/034736
A1 Matthew Chalk
A1 Boris Gutkin
A1 Sophie Deneve
YR 2015
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2015/12/17/034736.abstract
AB Cortical networks exhibit “global oscillations”, in which neural spike times are entrained to an underlying oscillatory rhythm, but where individual neurons fire irregularly, on only a fraction of cycles. While the network dynamics underlying global oscillations have been well characterised, their function is debated. Here, we show that such global oscillations are a direct consequence of optimal efficient coding in spiking networks with synaptic delays. To avoid firing unnecessary spikes, neurons need to share information about the network state. Ideally, membrane potentials should be strongly correlated and reflect a “prediction error” while the spikes themselves are uncorrelated and occur rarely. We show that the most efficient representation is achieved when: (i) spike times are entrained to a global Gamma rhythm (implying a consistent representation of the error); but (ii) few neurons fire on each cycle (implying high efficiency), while (iii) excitation and inhibition are tightly balanced. This suggests that cortical networks exhibiting such dynamics are tuned to achieve a maximally efficient population code.