The nature of the memory trace and its neurocomputational implications

The brain processes underlying cognitive tasks must be very robust. Disruptions such as the destruction of large numbers of neurons, or the impact of alcohol and lack of sleep do not have negative effects except when they occur in an extreme form. This robustness implies that the parameters determining the functioning of networks of individual neurons must have large ranges or there must exist stabilizing mechanisms that keep the functioning of a network within narrow bounds. The simulation of a minimal neuronal architecture necessary to study cognitive tasks is described, which consists of a loop of three cell-assemblies. A crucial factor in this architecture is the critical threshold of a cell-assembly. When activated at a level above the critical threshold, the activation in a cell-assembly is subject to autonomous growth, which leads to an oscillation in the loop. When activated below the critical threshold, excitation gradually extinguishes. In order to circumvent the large parameter space of spiking neurons, a rate-dependent model of neuronal firing was chosen. The resulting parameter space of 12 parameters was explored by means of a genetic algorithm. The ranges of the parameters for which the architecture produced the required oscillations and extinctions, turned out to be relatively narrow. These ranges remained narrow when a stabilizing mechanism, controlling the total amount of activation, was introduced. The architecture thus shows chaotic behaviour. Given the overall stability of the operation of the brain, it can be concluded that there must exist other mechanisms that make the network robust. Three candidate mechanisms are discussed: synaptic scaling, synaptic homeostasis, and the synchronization of neural spikes.