Relation between gamma oscillations and neuronal plasticity in the visual cortex

Use-dependent long-term changes of neuronal response properties must be gated to prevent irrelevant activity from inducing inappropriate modifications. Here we test the hypothesis that local network dynamics contribute to such gating. As synaptic modifications depend on temporal contiguity between presynaptic and postsynaptic activity, we examined the effect of synchronized gamma (ɣ) oscillations on stimulation-dependent modifications of orientation selectivity in adult cat visual cortex. Changes of orientation maps were induced by pairing visual stimulation with electrical activation of the mesencephalic reticular formation. Changes in orientation selectivity were assessed with optical recording of intrinsic signals and multiunit recordings. When conditioning stimuli were associated with strong ɣ-oscillations, orientation domains matching the orientation of the conditioning grating stimulus became more responsive and expanded, because neurons with preferences differing by less than 30° from the orientation of the conditioning grating shifted their orientation preference toward the conditioned orientation. When conditioning stimuli induced no or only weak ɣ-oscillations, responsiveness of neurons driven by the conditioning stimulus decreased. These differential effects depended on the power of oscillations in the low ɣ-band (20 Hz to 48 Hz) and not on differences in discharge rate of cortical neurons, because there was no correlation between the discharge rates during conditioning and the occurrence of changes in orientation preference. Thus, occurrence and polarity of use-dependent long-term changes of cortical response properties appear to depend on the occurrence of ɣ-oscillations during induction and hence on the degree of temporal coherence of the change-inducing network activity.