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The Journal of Neuroscience, October 29, 2008, 28(44):11153-11164; doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1586-08.2008

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Behavioral/Systems/Cognitive
Rapid Changes in Thalamic Firing Synchrony during Repetitive Whisker Stimulation

Simona Temereanca,^1,2 Emery N. Brown,^3,4 and Daniel J. Simons¹

¹Department of Neurobiology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15261, ²Massachusetts General Hospital/Massachusetts Institute of Technology/Harvard Medical School Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, Massachusetts 02129, ³Department of Anesthesia and Critical Care, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts 02114, and ⁴Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Harvard/Massachusetts Institute of Technology Division of Health Sciences and Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139

Correspondence should be addressed to Simona Temereanca, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, 149 13th Street, Suite 2301, Charlestown, MA 02129. Email: temerean{at}nmr.mgh.harvard.edu

Thalamic firing synchrony is thought to ensure selective transmission of relevant sensory information to the recipient cortical neurons by rendering them more responsive to temporally correlated input spikes. However, direct evidence for a synchrony code in the thalamus is limited. Here, we directly measure thalamic firing synchrony and its stimulus-induced modulation over time, using simultaneous single unit recordings from individual thalamic barreloids in the rat somatosensory whisker/barrel system. Employing whisker deflections varying in velocity or frequency and a cross-correlation approach, we find systematic changes in both time course and strength of thalamic firing synchrony as a function of stimulus parameters and sensory adaptation. Synchrony develops faster and is greater with higher velocity deflections. Greater firing synchrony reflects stimulus-dependent increases in instantaneous firing rates, greater spike time precision relative to stimulus onset as well as common input that likely arises from divergent trigeminothalamic and corticothalamic neurons. With adaptation, synchrony decreases and takes longer to develop but is more dependent on the cells' common inputs. Rapid, sharp increases in thalamic synchrony mirroring quick increases in whisker velocity occur also during ongoing random, high-frequency whisker vibrations. Together, results demonstrate millisecond by millisecond changes in thalamic near-synchronous firing during complex patterns of ongoing vibrissa movements that may ensure transmission of preferred sensory information in local thalamocortical circuits during whisking and active touch.

Key words: thalamocortical; firing synchrony; somatosensory; barreloid; barrel cortex; whiskers

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Received April 11, 2008; revised Aug. 5, 2008; accepted Sept. 25, 2008.

Correspondence should be addressed to Simona Temereanca, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, 149 13th Street, Suite 2301, Charlestown, MA 02129. Email: temerean{at}nmr.mgh.harvard.edu

This article has been cited by other articles:

				A. Ghoshal, P. Pouget, M. Popescu, and F. Ebner Early Bilateral Sensory Deprivation Blocks the Development of Coincident Discharge in Rat Barrel Cortex J. Neurosci., February 25, 2009; 29(8): 2384 - 2392. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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