Bernstein Network Computational Neuroscience
  • Home
  • Network
    • The Bernstein Network
    • Bernstein Centers
      • Berlin
      • Freiburg
      • Göttingen
      • Munich
      • Tübingen
      • Heidelberg-Mannheim
    • Research Infrastructure
      • High Performance Simulation and Data Analysis
      • Research Data Management
      • Science Communication
      • Scientific Coordination
    • Awards and Initiatives
      • Valentin Braitenberg Award
      • Brains for Brains Young Researcher Award
      • Bernstein SmartSteps
    • Committees
    • Statutes
    • Membership
    • History
    • Donation
    • Contact
  • Newsroom
    • Newsroom
    • News
    • Meet the Scientist
    • Events
    • Calls
    • Media Coverage
    • Press
    • Network Publications
    • Bernstein Bulletin
  • Teaching and Research
    • Teaching and Research
    • Find a Scientist
    • Degree Programs
      • Master Programs
      • PhD Programs
    • Study and Training
      • Bernstein Student Workshop Series 2023
      • Online Learning
      • Advanced Courses
      • Internships and Master theses
    • Mission Statement
  • Career
    • Career
    • Job Pool
    • Join our team
  • Bernstein Conference
    • Bernstein Conference
    • Call for Satellite Workshops
    • General Information
      • Tentative Schedule
      • Past Conferences
    • FAQ
  • EN
  • DE
  • Search
  • Menu Menu
You are here: Home1 / Newsroom2 / News3 / Different flavors of inhibition save the day
Frankfurt a.M. – August 23, 2022

Different flavors of inhibition save the day

Scientists gain insights on how deprivation-induced synaptic changes affect excitatory and inhibitory firing rates in the sensory cortex.

During development, lack of sensory experience elicits powerful plasticity mechanisms that alter brain circuitry. Many inhibitory neuron subtypes are known to influence circuit dynamics, however, how they interact with plasticity is not yet fully understood. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research in Frankfurt have investigated how synaptic plasticity in rodents, who were deprived of vision in one eye, affects network activity in a circuit model of the sensory cortex. Their findings point to the role of different inhibitory interneuron subtypes to explain the temporal pattern of firing rate change of excitatory and inhibitory neurons during sensory deprivation.

Synaptic plasticity regulates network activity in the sensory cortex of rodents who were deprived of vision in one eye. © Max Planck Institute for Brain Research / J. Kuhl

Multiple plasticity mechanisms interact and balance each other as they shape neural circuits during their development. A way to visualize the action of these mechanisms is to break the system and observe how it reacts. For decades, experimental neuroscientists have used monocular deprivation, a closure of one eye during specific periods in development. Regardless of its rich tradition in neuroscience, the effects of monocular deprivation still leave scientists with many unsolved riddles.

Only recently, experimentalists found that the firing rates of excitatory and inhibitory neurons are regulated in a distinct, cell-type specific manner by the plasticity induced by ongoing monocular deprivation. To investigate how the cell-type specific regulation is achieved, Julijana Gjorgjieva, research group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research and Professor at TU Munich and her graduate student Leonidas Richter developed a mechanistic model of the cortical circuit to study how the interactions of experimentally observed changes to synapses (the connections between neurons) regulate activity.

“We found that cell-type specific regulation is not easily achieved in a simple model of excitatory and a single type of inhibitory neurons as it is commonly used in modelling studies. We tied this result to the so-called paradoxical effect, which decreases inhibitory firing rates even when they are driven”, explains Richter.

The scientists analyzed how this effect plays out with the more complex plasticity induced by monocular deprivation. This allowed them to investigate the conditions for modulating excitatory and inhibitory firing rates in opposite directions. “We discovered that the diversity of inhibitory interneurons in the cortex is key to capture the regulation of firing rates especially when neurons are strongly connected as is the case in the cortex.”

“Diverse interneurons are known to play important specific roles in cortical computations. Our findings suggest that they also have a key role already in the development of the circuitry underlying these computations”, says Gjorgjieva.

Further links

Original press release

> more

Scientific publication

> more

Different flavors of inhibition save the day

24. August 2022/in Ausgewählter Aktuelles-Post für die Startseite /by Janina Radny

Kontakt Aktuelles

Contact

Julijana Gjorgjieva, Ph.D.

Max Planck Institute for Brain Research
Frankfurt am Main, Germany

gjorgjieva@brain.mpg.de

Dr. Irina Epstein

Max Planck Institute for Brain Research
Frankfurt am Main, Germany

+4969850033-2900
pr@brain.mpg.de

Bernstein Netzwerk Computational Neuroscience Logo

Become a member
Statutes
Donation
Subscribe to Newsletter

 

Follow us on

Mastodon
© 2023 Bernstein Network Computational Neuroscience
  • Contact
  • Imprint
  • Privacy Policy
Scroll to top
Cookie-Zustimmung verwalten
We use cookies to optimize our website and our service.
Functional Always active
Der Zugriff oder die technische Speicherung ist unbedingt für den rechtmäßigen Zweck erforderlich, um die Nutzung eines bestimmten Dienstes zu ermöglichen, der vom Abonnenten oder Nutzer ausdrücklich angefordert wurde, oder für den alleinigen Zweck der Übertragung einer Nachricht über ein elektronisches Kommunikationsnetz.
Vorlieben
Die technische Speicherung oder der Zugriff ist für den rechtmäßigen Zweck der Speicherung von Voreinstellungen erforderlich, die nicht vom Abonnenten oder Nutzer beantragt wurden.
Statistics
Die technische Speicherung oder der Zugriff, der ausschließlich zu statistischen Zwecken erfolgt. Die technische Speicherung oder der Zugriff, der ausschließlich zu anonymen statistischen Zwecken verwendet wird. Ohne eine Aufforderung, die freiwillige Zustimmung Ihres Internetdienstanbieters oder zusätzliche Aufzeichnungen von Dritten können die zu diesem Zweck gespeicherten oder abgerufenen Informationen allein in der Regel nicht zu Ihrer Identifizierung verwendet werden.
Marketing
Die technische Speicherung oder der Zugriff ist erforderlich, um Nutzerprofile zu erstellen, um Werbung zu versenden oder um den Nutzer auf einer Website oder über mehrere Websites hinweg zu ähnlichen Marketingzwecken zu verfolgen.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
Settings
{title} {title} {title}