| Paper: | PS-2A.44 | ||
| Session: | Poster Session 2A | ||
| Location: | H Lichthof | ||
| Session Time: | Sunday, September 15, 17:15 - 20:15 | ||
| Presentation Time: | Sunday, September 15, 17:15 - 20:15 | ||
| Presentation: | Poster | ||
| Publication: | 2019 Conference on Cognitive Computational Neuroscience, 13-16 September 2019, Berlin, Germany | ||
| Paper Title: | Abstract representations of space in the mouse dentate gyrus | ||
| Manuscript: | Click here to view manuscript | ||
| License: |  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. |
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| DOI: | https://doi.org/10.32470/CCN.2019.1403-0 | ||
| Authors: | Felix Taschbach, Maastricht University, Netherlands; Fabio Stefanini, Marcu K. Benna, Stefani Fusi, Zuckerman Mind Brain and Behavior Institute, Columbia University, United States | ||
| Abstract: | The hippocampus is known to encode variables that are relevant for navigation, like the position of the animal. However, it is unclear whether its neural representation is the result of an abstraction process or it reflects the encoding of complex sensory experiences that determine unequivocally a particular location. To answer this question, we analyzed calcium imaging data from the dentate gyrus and CA1 of mice freely exploring an arena. Both the position and the direction of motion of the animal could be decoded with high accuracy. We then analyzed the geometry of the neural representations to determine whether these variables are represented in an abstract format. The analysis revealed that the direction of movement is abstract when the animal is at the center of the arena, but not in the vicinity of a wall. These reveals qualitatively different geometries of the neural representations in these different locations which have been traditionally considered to have different behavioral valence for the animal. Our study represents a fundamental step towards the description of an abstract map of space in the hippocampus. | ||