Linking Cellular Mechanisms to Behavior: Entorhinal Persistent Spiking and Membrane Potential Oscillations May Underlie Path Integration, Grid Cell Firing, and Episodic Memory

The entorhinal cortex plays an important role in spatial memory and episodic memory functions. These functions may result from cellular mechanisms for integration of the afferent input to entorhinal cortex. This article reviews physiological data on persistent spiking and membrane potential oscillations in entorhinal cortex then presents models showing how both these cellular mechanisms could contribute to properties observed during unit recording, including grid cell firing, and how they could underlie behavioural functions including path integration. The interaction of oscillations and persistent firing could contribute to encoding and retrieval of trajectories through space and time as a mechanism relevant to episodic memory.Silvio O. Conte Center (NIMH MH71702, MH60450); National Institute of Mental Health Research (MH60013, MH61492); National Science Foundation (SLC SBE 0354378); National Institute of Drug Abuse (DA16454)

How a National Carbon Policy Could Affect Grain Variety Selection: The Case of Rice in Arkansas

This study conducts a life cycle assessment (LCA) of carbon emissions and estimates the carbon sequestered in 14 commonly sown rice varieties across the Arkansas Delta. Given the uncertainty regarding future carbon legislation, and increased consumer and industry demand for “greener” products, this study estimates how potential carbon policies would affect rice cultivar selection Hybrid rice varieties, given their higher yield and higher yield per unit of green house gas (GHG) emission, are better positioned to take advantage of any increase in consumer demand for “greener” products and/or absorb any government policy better than conventional rice cultivars.Rice, Carbon Policy, Cap and Trade, Carbon Offset, Agricultural and Food Policy, Crop Production/Industries, Environmental Economics and Policy, Q52, Q54, Q58,

Segregation of cortical head direction cell assemblies on alternating theta cycles

High-level cortical systems for spatial navigation, including entorhinal grid cells, critically depend on input from the head direction system. We examined spiking rhythms and modes of synchrony between neurons participating in head direction networks for evidence of internal processing, independent of direct sensory drive, which may be important for grid cell function. We found that head direction networks of rats were segregated into at least two populations of neurons firing on alternate theta cycles (theta cycle skipping) with fixed synchronous or anti-synchronous relationships. Pairs of anti-synchronous theta cycle skipping neurons exhibited larger differences in head direction tuning, with a minimum difference of 40 degrees of head direction. Septal inactivation preserved the head direction signal, but eliminated theta cycle skipping of head direction cells and grid cell spatial periodicity. We propose that internal mechanisms underlying cycle skipping in head direction networks may be critical for downstream spatial computation by grid cells.We kindly thank S. Gillet, J. Hinman, E. Newman and L. Ewell for their invaluable consultations and comments on previous versions of this manuscript, as well as M. Connerney, S. Eriksson, C. Libby and T. Ware for technical assistance and behavioral training. This work was supported by grants from the National Institute of Mental Health (R01 MH60013 and MH61492) and the Office of Naval Research Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (N00014-10-1-0936). (R01 MH60013 - National Institute of Mental Health; MH61492 - National Institute of Mental Health; N00014-10-1-0936 - Office of Naval Research Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative)Accepted manuscrip

A Model Combining Oscillations and Attractor Dynamics for Generation of Grid Cell Firing

Different models have been able to account for different features of the data on grid cell firing properties, including the relationship of grid cells to cellular properties and network oscillations. This paper describes a model that combines elements of two major classes of models of grid cells: models using interactions of oscillations and models using attractor dynamics. This model includes a population of units with oscillatory input representing input from the medial septum. These units are termed heading angle cells because their connectivity depends upon heading angle in the environment as well as the spatial phase coded by the cell. These cells project to a population of grid cells. The sum of the heading angle input results in standing waves of circularly symmetric input to the grid cell population. Feedback from the grid cell population increases the activity of subsets of the heading angle cells, resulting in the network settling into activity patterns that resemble the patterns of firing fields in a population of grid cells. The properties of heading angle cells firing as conjunctive grid-by-head-direction cells can shift the grid cell firing according to movement velocity. The pattern of interaction of oscillations requires use of separate populations that fire on alternate cycles of the net theta rhythmic input to grid cells

Sources of the spatial code within the hippocampus

Neurons in the hippocampus are thought to provide information on an animal's location within its environment. Input to the hippocampus comes via afferents from the entorhinal cortex, which are separated into several major pathways serving different hippocampal regions. Recent studies show the significance of individual afferent pathways in location perception, enhancing our understanding of hippocampal function

Linking Cellular Mechanisms to Behavior: Entorhinal Persistent Spiking and Membrane Potential Oscillations May Underlie Path Integration, Grid Cell Firing, and Episodic Memory

The entorhinal cortex plays an important role in spatial memory and episodic memory functions. These functions may result from cellular mechanisms for integration of the afferent input to entorhinal cortex. This article reviews physiological data on persistent spiking and membrane potential oscillations in entorhinal cortex then presents models showing how both these cellular mechanisms could contribute to properties observed during unit recording, including grid cell firing, and how they could underlie behavioural functions including path integration. The interaction of oscillations and persistent firing could contribute to encoding and retrieval of trajectories through space and time as a mechanism relevant to episodic memory

Quantitative bounds on morphodynamics and implications for reading the sedimentary record

Sedimentary rocks are the archives of environmental conditions and ancient planetary surface processes that led to their formation. Reconstructions of Earth’s past surface behaviour from the physical sedimentary record remain controversial, however, in part because we lack a quantitative framework to deconvolve internal dynamics of sediment-transport systems from environmental signal preservation. Internal dynamics of landscapes—a consequence of the coupling between bed topography, sediment transport and flow dynamics (morphodynamics)—result in regular and quasiperiodic landforms that abound on the Earth and other planets. Here, using theory and a data compilation of morphodynamic landforms that span a wide range of terrestrial, marine and planetary depositional systems, we show that the advection length for settling sediment sets bounds on the scales over which internal landscape dynamics operate. These bounds provide a universal palaeohydraulic reconstruction tool on planetary surfaces and allow for quantitative identification of depositional systems that may preserve tectonic, climatic and anthropogenic signals