AI Article Synopsis
- The brain and body undergo constant fluctuations in their state, affecting sensory processing and behavior.
- Recent studies show that rapid changes in awake animals help us understand how the brain optimizes sensory encoding and performance.
- Tracking state changes through pupillometry reveals that considering these fluctuations minimizes neural variability, suggesting the brain is more reliable than we previously believed.
Article Abstract
The state of the brain and body constantly varies on rapid and slow timescales. These variations contribute to the apparent noisiness of sensory responses at both the neural and the behavioral level. Recent investigations of rapid state changes in awake, behaving animals have provided insight into the mechanisms by which optimal sensory encoding and behavioral performance are achieved. Fluctuations in state, as indexed by pupillometry, impact both the "signal" (sensory evoked response) and the "noise" (spontaneous activity) of cortical responses. By taking these fluctuations into account, neural response (co)variability is significantly reduced, revealing the brain to be more reliable and predictable than previously thought.
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Source |
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| http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4718218 | PMC |
| http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2015.09.012 | DOI Listing |
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