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Fischer BJ, Shadron K, Ferger R, Peña JL. Single trial Bayesian inference by population vector readout in the barn owl's sound localization system. PLoS One 2024; 19:e0303843. [PMID: 38771860 PMCID: PMC11108143 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0303843] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/05/2023] [Accepted: 05/01/2024] [Indexed: 05/23/2024] Open
Abstract
Bayesian models have proven effective in characterizing perception, behavior, and neural encoding across diverse species and systems. The neural implementation of Bayesian inference in the barn owl's sound localization system and behavior has been previously explained by a non-uniform population code model. This model specifies the neural population activity pattern required for a population vector readout to match the optimal Bayesian estimate. While prior analyses focused on trial-averaged comparisons of model predictions with behavior and single-neuron responses, it remains unknown whether this model can accurately approximate Bayesian inference on single trials under varying sensory reliability, a fundamental condition for natural perception and behavior. In this study, we utilized mathematical analysis and simulations to demonstrate that decoding a non-uniform population code via a population vector readout approximates the Bayesian estimate on single trials for varying sensory reliabilities. Our findings provide additional support for the non-uniform population code model as a viable explanation for the barn owl's sound localization pathway and behavior.
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Affiliation(s)
- Brian J. Fischer
- Department of Mathematics, Seattle University, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Keanu Shadron
- Dominick P Purpura Department of Neuroscience, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, New York, United States of America
| | - Roland Ferger
- Dominick P Purpura Department of Neuroscience, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, New York, United States of America
| | - José L. Peña
- Dominick P Purpura Department of Neuroscience, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, New York, United States of America
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Shadron K, Peña JL. Development of frequency tuning shaped by spatial cue reliability in the barn owl's auditory midbrain. eLife 2023; 12:e84760. [PMID: 37166099 PMCID: PMC10238092 DOI: 10.7554/elife.84760] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/08/2022] [Accepted: 05/10/2023] [Indexed: 05/12/2023] Open
Abstract
Sensory systems preferentially strengthen responses to stimuli based on their reliability at conveying accurate information. While previous reports demonstrate that the brain reweighs cues based on dynamic changes in reliability, how the brain may learn and maintain neural responses to sensory statistics expected to be stable over time is unknown. The barn owl's midbrain features a map of auditory space where neurons compute horizontal sound location from the interaural time difference (ITD). Frequency tuning of midbrain map neurons correlates with the most reliable frequencies for the neurons' preferred ITD (Cazettes et al., 2014). Removal of the facial ruff led to a specific decrease in the reliability of high frequencies from frontal space. To directly test whether permanent changes in ITD reliability drive frequency tuning, midbrain map neurons were recorded from adult owls, with the facial ruff removed during development, and juvenile owls, before facial ruff development. In both groups, frontally tuned neurons were tuned to frequencies lower than in normal adult owls, consistent with the change in ITD reliability. In addition, juvenile owls exhibited more heterogeneous frequency tuning, suggesting normal developmental processes refine tuning to match ITD reliability. These results indicate causality of long-term statistics of spatial cues in the development of midbrain frequency tuning properties, implementing probabilistic coding for sound localization.
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Affiliation(s)
- Keanu Shadron
- Dominick P Purpura Department of Neuroscience, Albert Einstein College of MedicineBronxUnited States
| | - José Luis Peña
- Dominick P Purpura Department of Neuroscience, Albert Einstein College of MedicineBronxUnited States
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Ye R, Liu X. How the known reference weakens the visual oblique effect: a Bayesian account of cognitive improvement by cue influence. Sci Rep 2020; 10:20269. [PMID: 33219255 PMCID: PMC7680155 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-76911-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/13/2018] [Accepted: 11/03/2020] [Indexed: 12/02/2022] Open
Abstract
This paper investigates the influence of a known cue on the oblique effect in orientation identification and explains how subjects integrate cue information to identify target orientations. We design the psychophysical task in which subjects estimate target orientations in the presence of a known oriented reference line. For comparison the control experiments without the reference are conducted. Under Bayesian inference framework, a cue integration model is proposed to explain the perceptual improvement in the presence of the reference. The maximum likelihood estimates of the parameters of our model are obtained. In the presence of the reference, the variability and biases of identification are significantly reduced and the oblique effect of orientation identification is obviously weakened. Moreover, the identification of orientation in the vicinity of the reference line is consistently biased away from the reference line (i.e., reference repulsion). Comparing the predictions of the model with the experimental results, the Bayesian Least Squares estimator under the Variable-Precision encoding (BLS_VP) provides a better description of the experimental outcomes and captures the trade-off relationship of bias and precision of identification. Our results provide a useful step toward a better understanding of human visual perception in context of the known cues.
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Affiliation(s)
- Renyu Ye
- State Key Laboratory of Mechanics and Control of Mechanical Structures, Institute of Nano Science and Department of Mathematics, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing, 210016, China.,School of Mathematics and Physics, Anqing Normal University, Anqing, 246133, China
| | - Xinsheng Liu
- State Key Laboratory of Mechanics and Control of Mechanical Structures, Institute of Nano Science and Department of Mathematics, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing, 210016, China.
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Pavão R, Sussman ES, Fischer BJ, Peña JL. Natural ITD statistics predict human auditory spatial perception. eLife 2020; 9:e51927. [PMID: 33043884 PMCID: PMC7661036 DOI: 10.7554/elife.51927] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/17/2019] [Accepted: 10/09/2020] [Indexed: 11/28/2022] Open
Abstract
A neural code adapted to the statistical structure of sensory cues may optimize perception. We investigated whether interaural time difference (ITD) statistics inherent in natural acoustic scenes are parameters determining spatial discriminability. The natural ITD rate of change across azimuth (ITDrc) and ITD variability over time (ITDv) were combined in a Fisher information statistic to assess the amount of azimuthal information conveyed by this sensory cue. We hypothesized that natural ITD statistics underlie the neural code for ITD and thus influence spatial perception. To test this hypothesis, sounds with invariant statistics were presented to measure human spatial discriminability and spatial novelty detection. Human auditory spatial perception showed correlation with natural ITD statistics, supporting our hypothesis. Further analysis showed that these results are consistent with classic models of ITD coding and can explain the ITD tuning distribution observed in the mammalian brainstem.
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Affiliation(s)
- Rodrigo Pavão
- Dominick P. Purpura Department of Neuroscience - Albert Einstein College of MedicineNew YorkUnited States
- Centro de Matemática, Computação e Cognição - Universidade Federal do ABCSanto AndréBrazil
| | - Elyse S Sussman
- Dominick P. Purpura Department of Neuroscience - Albert Einstein College of MedicineNew YorkUnited States
| | - Brian J Fischer
- Department of Mathematics - Seattle UniversitySeattleUnited States
| | - José L Peña
- Dominick P. Purpura Department of Neuroscience - Albert Einstein College of MedicineNew YorkUnited States
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Effect of Stimulus-Dependent Spike Timing on Population Coding of Sound Location in the Owl's Auditory Midbrain. eNeuro 2020; 7:ENEURO.0244-19.2020. [PMID: 32188709 PMCID: PMC7189487 DOI: 10.1523/eneuro.0244-19.2020] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/24/2019] [Revised: 02/07/2020] [Accepted: 02/18/2020] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
In the auditory system, the spectrotemporal structure of acoustic signals determines the temporal pattern of spikes. Here, we investigated this effect in neurons of the barn owl's auditory midbrain (Tyto furcata) that are selective for auditory space and whether it can influence the coding of sound direction. We found that in the nucleus where neurons first become selective to combinations of sound localization cues, reproducibility of spike trains across repeated trials of identical sounds, a metric of across-trial temporal fidelity of spiking patterns evoked by a stimulus, was maximal at the sound direction that elicited the highest firing rate. We then tested the hypothesis that this stimulus-dependent patterning resulted in rate co-modulation of cells with similar frequency and spatial selectivity, driving stimulus-dependent synchrony of population responses. Tetrodes were used to simultaneously record multiple nearby units in the optic tectum (OT), where auditory space is topographically represented. While spiking of neurons in OT showed lower reproducibility across trials compared with upstream nuclei, spike-time synchrony between nearby OT neurons was highest for sounds at their preferred direction. A model of the midbrain circuit explained the relationship between stimulus-dependent reproducibility and synchrony, and demonstrated that this effect can improve the decoding of sound location from the OT output. Thus, stimulus-dependent spiking patterns in the auditory midbrain can have an effect on spatial coding. This study reports a functional connection between spike patterning elicited by spectrotemporal features of a sound and the coding of its location.
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Schillberg P, Brill S, Nikolay P, Ferger R, Gerhard M, Führ H, Wagner H. Sound localization in barn owls studied with manipulated head-related transfer functions: beyond broadband interaural time and level differences. J Comp Physiol A Neuroethol Sens Neural Behav Physiol 2020; 206:477-498. [PMID: 32140774 DOI: 10.1007/s00359-020-01410-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/22/2019] [Revised: 02/06/2020] [Accepted: 02/13/2020] [Indexed: 10/24/2022]
Abstract
Interaural time and level differences are important cues for sound localization. We wondered whether the broadband information contained in these two cues could fully explain the behavior of barn owls and responses of midbrain neurons in these birds. To tackle this problem, we developed a novel approach based on head-related transfer functions. These filters contain the complete information present at the eardrum. We selected positions in space characterized by equal broadband interaural time and level differences. Stimulation from such positions provides reduced information to the owl. We show that barn owls are able to discriminate between such positions. In many cases, but not all, the owls may have used spectral components of interaural level differences that exceeded the known behavioral resolution and variability for discrimination. Alternatively, the birds may have used template matching. Likewise, neurons in the optic tectum of the barn owl, a nucleus involved in sensorimotor integration, contained more information than is available in the broadband interaural time and level differences. Thus, these data show that more information is available and used by barn owls for sound localization than carried by broadband interaural time and level differences.
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Affiliation(s)
- Patrick Schillberg
- Institute of Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, 52074, Aachen, Germany
| | - Sandra Brill
- Institute of Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, 52074, Aachen, Germany
| | - Petra Nikolay
- Institute of Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, 52074, Aachen, Germany
| | - Roland Ferger
- Institute of Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, 52074, Aachen, Germany.,Dominick P. Purpura Department of Neuroscience, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, 1300 Morris Park Avenue, Bronx, NY, 10461, USA
| | - Maike Gerhard
- Lehrstuhl A für Mathematik, RWTH Aachen University, Templergraben 55, 52056, Aachen, Germany
| | - Hartmut Führ
- Lehrstuhl A für Mathematik, RWTH Aachen University, Templergraben 55, 52056, Aachen, Germany
| | - Hermann Wagner
- Institute of Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 3, 52074, Aachen, Germany.
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Synthesis of Hemispheric ITD Tuning from the Readout of a Neural Map: Commonalities of Proposed Coding Schemes in Birds and Mammals. J Neurosci 2019; 39:9053-9061. [PMID: 31570537 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0873-19.2019] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/01/2019] [Revised: 09/23/2019] [Accepted: 09/25/2019] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
A major cue to infer sound direction is the difference in arrival time of the sound at the left and right ears, called interaural time difference (ITD). The neural coding of ITD and its similarity across species have been strongly debated. In the barn owl, an auditory specialist relying on sound localization to capture prey, ITDs within the physiological range determined by the head width are topographically represented at each frequency. The topographic representation suggests that sound direction may be inferred from the location of maximal neural activity within the map. Such topographical representation of ITD, however, is not evident in mammals. Instead, the preferred ITD of neurons in the mammalian brainstem often lies outside the physiological range and depends on the neuron's best frequency. Because of these disparities, it has been assumed that how spatial hearing is achieved in birds and mammals is fundamentally different. However, recent studies reveal ITD responses in the owl's forebrain and midbrain premotor area that are consistent with coding schemes proposed in mammals. Particularly, sound location in owls could be decoded from the relative firing rates of two broadly and inversely ITD-tuned channels. This evidence suggests that, at downstream stages, the code for ITD may not be qualitatively different across species. Thus, while experimental evidence continues to support the notion of differences in ITD representation across species and brain regions, the latest results indicate notable commonalities, suggesting that codes driving orienting behavior in mammals and birds may be comparable.
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