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Published on: September 15, 2017
Post-error recruitment of frontal sensory cortical projections promotes attention in mice
Kevin J Norman1, Justin S Riceberg2, Hiroyuki Koike1
1Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, One Gustave L. Levy Place, New York, NY 10029, USA; Department of Neuroscience, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, One Gustave L. Levy Place, New York, NY 10029, USA; Department of Ophthalmology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, One Gustave L. Levy Place, New York, NY 10029, USA; Mindich Child Health and Development Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, One Gustave L. Levy Place, New York, NY 10029, USA; Friedman Brain Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, One Gustave L. Levy Place, New York, NY 10029, USA.
Abstract:
The frontal cortex, especially the anterior cingulate cortex area (ACA), is essential for exerting cognitive control after errors, but the mechanisms that enable modulation of attention to improve performance after errors are poorly understood. Here we demonstrate that during a mouse visual attention task, ACA neurons projecting to the visual cortex (VIS; ACAVIS neurons) are recruited selectively by recent errors. Optogenetic manipulations of this pathway collectively support the model that rhythmic modulation of ACAVIS neurons in anticipation of visual stimuli is crucial for adjusting performance following errors. 30-Hz optogenetic stimulation of ACAVIS neurons in anesthetized mice recapitulates the increased gamma and reduced theta VIS oscillatory changes that are associated with endogenous post-error performance during behavior and subsequently increased visually evoked spiking, a hallmark feature of visual attention. This frontal sensory neural circuit links error monitoring with implementing adjustments of attention to guide behavioral adaptation, pointing to a circuit-based mechanism for promoting cognitive control.
