TY  - JOUR
A1  - Schaefer, Markus K.
A1  - Kössl, Manfred
A1  - Hechavarria-Cueria, Julio C.
T1  - Laminar differences in response to simple and spectro-temporally complex sounds in the primary auditory cortex of ketamine-anesthetized gerbils
T2  - PLoS one
N2  - In mammals, acoustic communication plays an important role during social behaviors. Despite their ethological relevance, the mechanisms by which the auditory cortex represents different communication call properties remain elusive. Recent studies have pointed out that communication-sound encoding could be based on discharge patterns of neuronal populations. Following this idea, we investigated whether the activity of local neuronal networks, such as those occurring within individual cortical columns, is sufficient for distinguishing between sounds that differed in their spectro-temporal properties. To accomplish this aim, we analyzed simple pure-tone and complex communication call elicited multi-unit activity (MUA) as well as local field potentials (LFP), and current source density (CSD) waveforms at the single-layer and columnar level from the primary auditory cortex of anesthetized Mongolian gerbils. Multi-dimensional scaling analysis was used to evaluate the degree of “call-specificity” in the evoked activity. The results showed that whole laminar profiles segregated 1.8-2.6 times better across calls than single-layer activity. Also, laminar LFP and CSD profiles segregated better than MUA profiles. Significant differences between CSD profiles evoked by different sounds were more pronounced at mid and late latencies in the granular and infragranular layers and these differences were based on the absence and/or presence of current sinks and on sink timing. The stimulus-specific activity patterns observed within cortical columns suggests that the joint activity of local cortical populations (as local as single columns) could indeed be important for encoding sounds that differ in their acoustic attributes.
Y1  - 2017
UR  - http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/39541
UR  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-395413
SN  - 1932-6203
N1  - Copyright: © 2017 Schaefer et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
VL  - 12
IS  - (8): e0182514
SP  - 1
EP  - 28
PB  - PLoS
CY  - Lawrence, Kan.
ER  -