Andrew Gyles <syzygium at alphalink.com.au> wrote:
> In article <1em22oz.1ck5cit1l7pviaN%harry at dherwin.org>,
>harry at dherwin.org (Harry Erwin, Ph. D.) wrote:
> > Theophilus Samuels <theophilus.samuels at btinternet.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Elaborate please.
> >
> > What about Simmons's evidence for 10-100 nanosecond resolution of
> range
> > in bat biosonar? The neurons involved are comparable to typical
> > mammalian neurons in their recovery times and rates of spiking. That's
> > pretty good evidence that the key cue is the exact timing of the
> action
> > potentials involved, not their presence or absence.
> >
> > What about Levy's work on variable timing of action potential
> generation
> > in the hippocampus? During replay, the neurons spike much more quickly
> > than they did during the initial exposure to the stimuli.
> >
>> > --
> > Harry Erwin, PhD, <mailto:harry at dherwin.org>,
> > Senior Lecturer in Computing at the University of Sunderland,
> > Computational Neuroscientist (modeling bat behavior) and
> > Senior SW Analyst and Security Engineer.
> >
>> I am not a specialist and I do not dispute what you say here. Indeed I
> find attractive the idea that information is encoded in the exact
> timing of the spikes. Is there any information yet on what 'reads' the
> time intervals between spikes and 'decodes' them to give back the
> original information to the receiving neuron (or neurons)? At the least
> a 'stopwatch' would be needed, would it not?
>
Yes, the sensitivity of neurons appears to be time and spiking-order
dependent. In the bat, we have a very nice monotonic inhibitory signal
that dies down as the time since the call was generated increases.
--
Harry Erwin, PhD, <mailto:harry at dherwin.org>,
Senior Lecturer in Computing at the University of Sunderland,
Computational Neuroscientist (modeling bat behavior) and
Senior SW Analyst and Security Engineer.