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Updated: Jul 8, 2025

Combined Shuttle-Box Training with Electrophysiological Cortex Recording and Stimulation as a Tool to Study Perception and Learning
Published on: October 22, 2015
Primate neocortex performs balanced sensory amplification
Jagruti J Pattadkal1, Boris V Zemelman1, Ila Fiete2
1Department of Neuroscience, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA.
Abstract:
The sensory cortex amplifies relevant features of external stimuli. This sensitivity and selectivity arise through the transformation of inputs by cortical circuitry. We characterize the circuit mechanisms and dynamics of cortical amplification by making large-scale simultaneous measurements of single cells in awake primates and testing computational models. By comparing network activity in both driven and spontaneous states with models, we identify the circuit as operating in a regime of non-normal balanced amplification. Incoming inputs are strongly but transiently amplified by strong recurrent feedback from the disruption of excitatory-inhibitory balance in the network. Strong inhibition rapidly quenches responses, thereby permitting the tracking of time-varying stimuli.
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