Basic Properties of Coordinated Neuronal Ensembles in the Auditory Thalamus
Coordinated neuronal activity has been identified to play an important role in information processing and transmission in the brain. However, current research predominantly focuses on understanding the properties and functions of neuronal coordination in hippocampal and cortical areas, leaving subco...
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Published in: | The Journal of neuroscience Vol. 44; no. 19; p. e1729232024 |
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Main Authors: | , , |
Format: | Journal Article |
Language: | English |
Published: |
United States
Society for Neuroscience
08-05-2024
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Subjects: | |
Online Access: | Get full text |
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Summary: | Coordinated neuronal activity has been identified to play an important role in information processing and transmission in the brain. However, current research predominantly focuses on understanding the properties and functions of neuronal coordination in hippocampal and cortical areas, leaving subcortical regions relatively unexplored. In this study, we use single-unit recordings in female Sprague-Dawley rats to investigate the properties and functions of groups of neurons exhibiting coordinated activity in the auditory thalamus -- the medial geniculate body (MGB). We reliably identify coordinated neuronal ensembles (cNEs), which are groups of neurons that fire synchronously, in the MGB. cNEs are shown not to be the result of false positive detections or byproducts of slow state oscillations in anesthetized animals. We demonstrate that cNEs in the MGB have enhanced information encoding properties over individual neurons. Their neuronal composition is stable between spontaneous and evoked activity, suggesting limited stimulus-induced ensemble dynamics. These MGB cNE properties are similar to what is observed for cNEs in the primary auditory cortex (A1), suggesting that ensembles serve as a ubiquitous mechanism for organizing local networks and play a fundamental role in sensory processing within the brain.
Temporal coordination of neuronal activity has been widely observed in various cortical areas and has been shown to be important for signal processing and information transmission in the brain. However, it remains unclear whether neuronal coordination is exclusive to cortical local networks or if it also holds significance in subcortical regions. We conducted single-unit recordings to investigate coordinated neuronal ensembles (cNEs), which are groups of neurons with synchronous firing, in both the auditory thalamus and cortex. We demonstrated the existence of cNEs in the auditory thalamus, which have similar properties to cNEs in the auditory cortex. This provides evidence that subcortical neuronal coordination can serve as a fundamental mechanism for organizing and processing neural signals. |
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Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 Author contributions: C.E.S. designed research; C.H. and C.E.S. performed research; C.H., A.R.H., and C.E.S. analyzed data; C.H. wrote the paper. We thank Drs. Jermyn See and Natsumi Homma for their help with software and data collection. This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (DC002260 and DC017396 to C.E.S. and DC014101, NS116598, MH122478, and EY025174 to A.R.H.), the Klingenstein Foundation (A.R.H.), PBBR Breakthrough Fund (A.R.H.), the Coleman Memorial Fund (A.R.H., C.E.S.), and Hearing Research (C.E.S., A.R.H). The authors declare no competing financial interests. |
ISSN: | 0270-6474 1529-2401 1529-2401 |
DOI: | 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1729-23.2024 |