Abstract
In the context of a behaviourally oriented investigation of neural information processing we have studied single unit responses from cochlear nucleus (12 units) and auditory cortex (23 units) of the cat. Attention was focused on two aspects: the composition of a wide stimulus ensemble and the influence of this ensemble on the single unit neural activity: action potentials or neural events. The stimulus ensemble was based on sounds occurring in the natural environment of the animal: the Acoustic Biotope. A realization of such an ensemble was constructed and used in the experiments. A systematic analysis of the effect of this stimulus ensemble on the neural activity comprises different questions with respect to a possible stimulus-event relation: existence and nature. In the present paper emphasis is given to the question of existence of a s-e relation. The existence of such a relation has been investigated by presenting the stimulus ensemble twice. The degree of reproducibility of neural activity indicates to what extent a s-e relation indeed exists. A formal measure of testing the reproducibility of two sequences of neural events is defined: the Cross Coincidence Function. Results are presented, interpretation and formal problems discussed. Results obtained so far indicate that on the whole the existence of a s-e relation can be established more definitely for cochlear nucleus units than for auditory cortex units. Applications of the presented procedure arise in exploratory investigations in central regions of the sensory nervous system and in regions with presumed multimodal inputs.
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Johannesma, P.I.M.: The pre-response stimulus ensemble of neurons in the cochlear nucleus. In: Proc. of the IPO Symp. on Hearing Theory, pp. 58–69. Cardozo, B.L., ed. Eindhoven, The Netherlands 1972
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Lee, Y.W.: Statistical theory of communication. New York: Wiley 1960
Lee, Y.W., Schetzen, M.: Measurement of the Wiener kernels of a nonlinear system by cross-correlation. Int. J. Control 2, 237–254 (1965)
Marmarelis, P.Z., McCann, G.D.: Development and application of white-noise modeling techniques for studies of insect visual nervous system. Kybernetik 12, 74–89 (1973)
Marmarelis, P.Z., Naka, K.-I.: Nonlinear analysis and synthesis of receptive-field responses in the catfish retina. I. Horizontal cell→ganglion cell chain. J. Neurophysiol. 36, 605–618 (1973a)
Marmarelis, P.Z., Naka, K.-I.: Nonlinear analysis and synthesis of receptive-field responses in the catfish retina. II. One-input white-noise analysis. J. Neurophysiol. 36, 619–633 (1973b)
Marmarelis, P.Z., Naka, K.-I.: Nonlinear analysis and synthesis of receptive-field responses in the catfish retina. III. Two-input white-noise analysis. J. Neurophysiol. 36, 634–648 (1973c)
Moore, G.P., Perkel, D.H., Segundo, J.P.: Statistical analysis and functional interpretation of neuronal spike data. Annu. Rev. Physiol. 28, 493–522 (1966)
Moore, G.P., Segundo, J.P., Perkel, D.H., Levitan, H.: Statistical signs of synaptic interaction in neurons. Biophys. J. 10, 876–900 (1970)
Newman, J.D., rapp.: Biological filtering and neural mechanisms-group report. In: Recognition of complex acoustic signals. pp. 279–306. Bullock, T.H. ed. Life Sciences Res. Rep., Vol. 5. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer 1977
Odum, E.P.: Fundamentals of ecology. Philadelphia: Saunders 1971
Papoulis, A.: The Fourier integral and its applications. New York: McGraw-Hill 1962
Perkel, D.H., Gerstein, G.L., Moore, G.P.: Neuronal spike trains and stochastic point processes. II. Simultaneous spike trains. Biophys. J. 7, 419–440 (1967)
Ribaupierre, F. de, Goldstein, Jr., M.H., Yeni-Komshian, G.: Intracellular study of the cat's primary auditory cortex. Brain Res. 48, 185–204 (1972)
Scheich, H.: Central processing of complex sounds and feature analysis. In: Recognition of complex acoustic signals. pp. 161–182. Bullock, T.H., ed. Life Sciences Res. Rep., Vol. 5. Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer 1977
Seelen, W. von, Hoffman, K.-P.: Analysis of neuronal networks in the visual system of the cat using statistical signals. Biol. Cybernetics 22, 7–20 (1976)
Smolders, J.W.T., Aertsen, A.M.H.J., Johannesma, P.I.M.: Neural representation of the acoustic biotope: on the usefulness of biologically relevant sounds in the investigation of single auditory neurons (in preparation)
Worden, F.G., Galambos, R. (eds.): Auditory processing of biologically significant sounds. Neurosci. Res. Prog. Bull., Vol. 10. Brookline, Mass.: Neurosciences Research Program 1972
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Aertsen, A.M.H.J., Smolders, J.W.T. & Johannesma, P.I.M. Neural representation of the acoustic biotope: On the existence of stimulus-event relations for sensory neurons. Biol. Cybernetics 32, 175–185 (1979). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00337394
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00337394