RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Competition for Neurotrophic Factors: Ocular Dominance Columns
JF The Journal of Neuroscience
JO J. Neurosci.
FD Society for Neuroscience
SP 5850
OP 5858
DO 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.18-15-05850.1998
VO 18
IS 15
A1 Terry Elliott
A1 Nigel R. Shadbolt
YR 1998
UL http://www.jneurosci.org/content/18/15/5850.abstract
AB Activity-dependent competition between afferents in the primary visual cortex of many mammals is a quintessential feature of neuronal development. From both experimental and theoretical perspectives, understanding the mechanisms underlying competition is a significant challenge. Recent experimental work suggests that geniculocortical afferents might compete for retrograde neurotrophic factors. We show that a mathematically well-characterized model of retrograde neurotrophic interactions, in which the afferent uptake of neurotrophic factors is activity-dependent and in which the average level of uptake determines the complexity of the axonal arbors of afferents, permits the anatomical segregation of geniculocortical afferents into ocular dominance columns. The model induces segregation provided that the levels of neurotrophic factors available either by activity-independent release from cortical cells or by exogenous cortical infusion are not too high; otherwise segregation breaks down. We show that the model exhibits changes in ocular dominance column periodicity in response to changes in interocular image correlations and that the model predicts that changes in intraocular image correlations should also affect columnar periodicity.