Engaging in an auditory task suppresses responses in rat auditory cortex
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1
Stony Brook University, United States
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2
Stony Brook University, Graduate Program in Neuroscience, United States
Although the systems involved in attentional selection have been studied extensively, much less is known about the non-selective systems necessary to engage in a sensory task. To study these preparatory mechanisms, we compared neural activity in the auditory cortex elicited by sounds while rats performed a two-alternative choice auditory task (“engaged” condition) with those elicited by identical stimuli while subjects were awake but not performing a task (“idle” condition). Surprisingly, we found that engagement consistently suppressed cortical responses, an effect opposite in sign to that elicited by selective attention. In the auditory thalamus, engagement enhanced spontaneous firing rates but did not affect evoked responses, suggesting a simple model in which synaptic depression at the thalamocortical inputs attenuates the impact of the sensory stimulus. The cortical suppression associated with engagement might represent a switch from a neural representation optimized for signal detection to one better suited for auditory discrimination.
Conference:
Bernstein Symposium 2008, Munich, Germany, 8 Oct - 10 Oct, 2008.
Presentation Type:
Poster Presentation
Topic:
All Abstracts
Citation:
Otazu
G,
Lung-Hao
T and
Zador
AM
(2008). Engaging in an auditory task suppresses responses in rat auditory cortex.
Front. Comput. Neurosci.
Conference Abstract:
Bernstein Symposium 2008.
doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.10.2008.01.100
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Received:
17 Nov 2008;
Published Online:
17 Nov 2008.
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Correspondence:
Gonzalo Otazu, Stony Brook University, New York, United States, otazu@cshl.edu