Anatomical organization of presubicular head-direction circuits

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Abstract

Neurons coding for head-direction are crucial for spatial navigation. Here we explored the cellular basis of head-direction coding in the rat dorsal presubiculum (PreS). We found that layer2 is composed of two principal cell populations (calbindin-positive and calbindin-negative neurons) which targeted the contralateral PreS and retrosplenial cortex, respectively. Layer3 pyramidal neurons projected to the medial entorhinal cortex (MEC). By juxtacellularly recording PreS neurons in awake rats during passive-rotation, we found that head-direction responses were preferentially contributed by layer3 pyramidal cells, whose long-range axons branched within layer3 of the MEC. In contrast, layer2 neurons displayed distinct spike-shapes, were not modulated by head-direction but rhythmically-entrained by theta-oscillations. Fast-spiking interneurons showed only weak directionality and theta-rhythmicity, but were significantly modulated by angular velocity. Our data thus indicate that PreS neurons differentially contribute to head-direction coding, and point to a cell-type- and layer-specific routing of directional and non-directional information to downstream cortical targets.

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Patricia Preston-Ferrer

Werner-Reichardt Centre for Integrative Neuroscience, Tübingen, Germany

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
Stefano Coletta

Werner-Reichardt Centre for Integrative Neuroscience, Tübingen, Germany

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
Markus Frey

Werner-Reichardt Centre for Integrative Neuroscience, Tübingen, Germany

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
Andrea Burgalossi

Werner-Reichardt Centre for Integrative Neuroscience, Tübingen, Germany

For correspondence
andrea.burgalossi@cin.uni-tuebingen.de

Competing interests
The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

Ethics

Animal experimentation: All experimental procedures were performed according to the German guidelines on animal welfare and approved by the local institution in charge of experiments using animals (Regierungspraesidium Tuebingen, permit numbers CIN2/14, CIN5/14 and CIN8/14).

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This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.