Impact of functional synapse clusters on neuronal response selectivity

Ujfalussy, Balázs B. and Makara, Judit K. (2020) Impact of functional synapse clusters on neuronal response selectivity. NATURE COMMUNICATIONS, 11. pp. 1-14. ISSN 2041-1723

Preview

Text s41467-020-15147-6.pdf Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (24MB) | Preview

Abstract

Clustering of functionally similar synapses in dendrites is thought to affect neuronal input-output transformation by triggering local nonlinearities. However, neither the in vivo impact of synaptic clusters on somatic membrane potential (sVm), nor the rules of cluster formation are elucidated. We develop a computational approach to measure the effect of functional synaptic clusters on sVm response of biophysical model CA1 and L2/3 pyramidal neurons to in vivo-like inputs. We demonstrate that small synaptic clusters appearing with random connectivity do not influence sVm. With structured connectivity, ~10–20 synapses/cluster are optimal for clustering-based tuning via state-dependent mechanisms, but larger selectivity is achieved by 2-fold potentiation of the same synapses. We further show that without nonlinear amplification of the effect of random clusters, action potential-based, global plasticity rules cannot generate functional clustering. Our results suggest that clusters likely form via local synaptic interactions, and have to be moderately large to impact sVm responses.

Actions (login required)

Edit Item