On the precision of neural computation with interaural level differences in the lateral superior olive

0397917 - ÚEM 2014 RIV NL eng J - Journal Article
Bureš, Zbyněk - Maršálek, P.
On the precision of neural computation with interaural level differences in the lateral superior olive.
Brain Research. Roč. 1536, Nov 6 (2013), s. 16-26. ISSN 0006-8993. E-ISSN 1872-6240
R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GAP303/12/1347
Grant - others:GA MZd(CZ) NT11532
Institutional support: RVO:68378041
Keywords : binaural hearing * interaural level difference * just-noticeable difference
Subject RIV: FH - Neurology
Impact factor: 2.828, year: 2013

Interaural level difference (ILD) is one of the basic binaural clues in the spatial localization of a sound source. In the mammalian auditory brainstem, the ILD is processed by a neuronal circuit of binaural neurons in the lateral superior olive (LSO). The principal function of LSO neurons is to estimate and encode the difference between the discharge rates of the excitatory and inhibitory inputs. Two general mechanisms of this operation are biologically plausible: 1) subtraction of firing rates integrated over longer time intervals, and 2) detection of coincidence of individual spikes within shorter time intervals. We investigate whether the two general mechanisms are capable of the desired performance. We determine the theoretical ILD accuracy expressed by means of the just-noticeable difference (JND) in dependence on the statistics of the interacting spike trains, the overall firing rate, detection time, the number of converging fibers, and on the neural mechanism itself. We demonstrate that the JNDs rely on the precision of spike timing. Furthermore, a mechanism based on excitatory and inhibitory coincidence detection may give better results than the subtraction of firing rates.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0225650