Learning reward timing in cortex through reward dependent expression of synaptic plasticity
Name
Gavornik-2009-Learning reward timi.pdf
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Author(s)
Gavornik, Jeffrey
Shuler, Marshal G. Hussain
Loewenstein, Yonatan
Bear, Mark
Shouval, Harel Z.
Date Issued
April 2009
Journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Publisher
National Academy of Sciences
Citation
Gavornik, Jeffrey P et al. “Learning reward timing in cortex through reward dependent expression of synaptic plasticity.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 106.16 (2009): 6826-6831.
Version
Final published version
Abstract
The ability to represent time is an essential component of cognition but its neural basis is unknown. Although extensively studied both behaviorally and electrophysiologically, a general theoretical framework describing the elementary neural mechanisms used by the brain to learn temporal representations is lacking. It is commonly believed that the underlying cellular mechanisms reside in high order cortical regions but recent studies show sustained neural activity in primary sensory cortices that can represent the timing of expected reward. Here, we show that local cortical networks can learn temporal representations through a simple framework predicated on reward dependent expression of synaptic plasticity. We assert that temporal representations are stored in the lateral synaptic connections between neurons and demonstrate that reward-modulated plasticity is sufficient to learn these representations. We implement our model numerically to explain reward-time learning in the primary visual cortex (V1), demonstrate experimental support, and suggest additional experimentally verifiable predictions.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Picower Institute for Learning and Memory
Terms of Use
Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.
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DOI of Published Version
http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0901835106
