Mirrored STDP Implements Autoencoder Learning in a Network of Spiking Neurons.

The autoencoder algorithm is a simple but powerful unsupervised method for training neural networks. Autoencoder networks can learn sparse distributed codes similar to those seen in cortical sensory areas such as visual area V1, but they can also be stacked to learn increasingly abstract representations. Several computational neuroscience models of sensory areas, including Olshausen & Field's Sparse Coding algorithm, can be seen as autoencoder variants, and autoencoders have seen extensive use in the machine learning community.

Depression-biased reverse plasticity rule is required for stable learning at top-down connections.

Top-down synapses are ubiquitous throughout neocortex and play a central role in cognition, yet little is known about their development and specificity. During sensory experience, lower neocortical areas are activated before higher ones, causing top-down synapses to experience a preponderance of post-synaptic activity preceding pre-synaptic activity. This timing pattern is the opposite of that experienced by bottom-up synapses, which suggests that different versions of spike-timing dependent synaptic plasticity (STDP) rules may be required at top-down synapses.

Slide-and-cluster models for spindle assembly.

Background: Mitotic and meiotic spindles are assemblies of microtubules (MTs) that form during cell division to physically separate sister chromosomes. How the various components of spindles act together to establish and maintain the dynamic bipolar structure of spindles is not understood. Interactions between MTs and motors have been studied both experimentally and theoretically in many contexts, including the self-organization of arrays of MTs by motors and the competition between different classes of motors to move a single load.

A new method reveals microtubule minus ends throughout the meiotic spindle.

Anastral meiotic spindles are thought to be organized differently from astral mitotic spindles, but the field lacks the basic structural information required to describe and model them, including the location of microtubule-nucleating sites and minus ends. We measured the distributions of oriented microtubules in metaphase anastral spindles in Xenopus laevis extracts by fluorescence speckle microscopy and cross-correlation analysis. We localized plus ends by tubulin incorporation and combined this with the orientation data to infer the localization of minus ends.

The kinesin Eg5 drives poleward microtubule flux in Xenopus laevis egg extract spindles.

Although mitotic and meiotic spindles maintain a steady-state length during metaphase, their antiparallel microtubules slide toward spindle poles at a constant rate. This "poleward flux" of microtubules occurs in many organisms and may provide part of the force for chromosome segregation. We use quantitative image analysis to examine the role of the kinesin Eg5 in poleward flux in metaphase Xenopus laevis egg extract spindles.