Context-dependent signaling of coincident auditory and visual events in primary visual cortex
- CNRS, France
Abstract
Detecting rapid, coincident changes across sensory modalities is essential for recognition of sudden threats or events. Using two-photon calcium imaging in identified cell types in awake, head-fixed mice, we show that, among the basic features of a sound envelope, loud sound onsets are a dominant feature coded by the auditory cortex neurons projecting to primary visual cortex (V1). In V1, a small number of layer 1 interneurons gates this cross-modal information flow in a context-dependent manner. In dark conditions, auditory cortex inputs lead to suppression of the V1 population. However, when sound input coincides with a visual stimulus, visual responses are boosted in V1, most strongly after loud sound onsets. Thus, a dynamic, asymmetric circuit connecting AC and V1 contributes to the encoding of visual events that are coincident with sounds.
Data availability
Data and software availability. The data that support the findings of this study are freely available at https://www.bathellier-lab.org/downloads or at Dryad, doi:10.5061/dryad.82r5q83. Custom analysis scripts are available as a source code file.
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Data from: Context-dependent signaling of coincident auditory and visual events in primary visual cortexDryad Digital Repository, doi:10.5061/dryad.82r5q83.
Article and author information
Author details
Funding
Agence Nationale de la Recherche (Retour Postdoc)
- Deneux Thomas
- Brice Bathellier
Human Frontier Science Program (CDA)
- Evan R Harrell
- Brice Bathellier
H2020 European Research Council (ERC CoG)
- Alexandre Kempf
- Sebastian Ceballo
- Anton Filipchuk
- Brice Bathellier
Seventh Framework Programme (Marie Curie CiG)
- Brice Bathellier
Fondation pour l'Audition (Lab grant)
- Evan R Harrell
- Brice Bathellier
École Doctorale Frontières du Vivant - Programme Bettencourt (Phd fellowship)
- Alexandre Kempf
Paris-Saclay University (NeuroSaclay Brainscopes)
- Brice Bathellier
Ecole des Neurosciences de Paris (Phd fellowship)
- Sebastian Ceballo
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Ethics
Animal experimentation: All animal procedures were approved by the French Ethical Committee (authorization 00275.01).
Copyright
© 2019, Thomas et al.
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.
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Context-dependent signaling of coincident auditory and visual events in primary visual cortex
eLife 8:e44006.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.44006
Further reading
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- Neuroscience
When navigating environments with changing rules, human brain circuits flexibly adapt how and where we retain information to help us achieve our immediate goals.
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- Neuroscience
Human-specific cognitive abilities depend on information processing in the cerebral cortex, where the neurons are significantly larger and their processes longer and sparser compared to rodents. We found that, in synaptically connected layer 2/3 pyramidal cells (L2/3 PCs), the delay in signal propagation from soma to soma is similar in humans and rodents. To compensate for the longer processes of neurons, membrane potential changes in human axons and/or dendrites must propagate faster. Axonal and dendritic recordings show that the propagation speed of action potentials (APs) is similar in human and rat axons, but the forward propagation of excitatory postsynaptic potentials (EPSPs) and the backward propagation of APs are 26 and 47% faster in human dendrites, respectively. Experimentally-based detailed biophysical models have shown that the key factor responsible for the accelerated EPSP propagation in human cortical dendrites is the large conductance load imposed at the soma by the large basal dendritic tree. Additionally, larger dendritic diameters and differences in cable and ion channel properties in humans contribute to enhanced signal propagation. Our integrative experimental and modeling study provides new insights into the scaling rules that help maintain information processing speed albeit the large and sparse neurons in the human cortex.
