Luca Mazzucato | FunSy Seminar | Predicting the effect of micro-stimulation on spontaneous dynamics
Channel: Funsy-Seminars
Date: 2023-06-01

FunSy seminar 10/05/2023 | University of Strasbourg | France

Title:  Predicting the effect of micro-stimulation on macaque prefrontal activity based on spontaneous circuit dynamics.

Abstract: A crucial challenge in targeted manipulation of neural activity is to identify perturbation sites whose stimulation exerts significant effects downstream (high efficacy), a procedure currently achieved by labor-intensive and potentially harmful trial-and-error. Targeted perturbations will be greatly facilitated by understanding causal interactions within neural ensembles to guide the design of intervention protocols. Can one predict the effects of electrical stimulation on neural activity solely based on the properties of circuit dynamics during spontaneous periods? Here, we show that the effects of single-site microstimulation on ensemble activity in an alert monkey’s prefrontal cortex can be predicted solely based on the ensemble spontaneous activity. 

We infer the ensemble’s functional causal flow (FCF) based on the functional interactions inferred at rest. We compare the performance of alternative classes of models based on information theory, such as transfer entropy and granger causality, or deterministic dynamical systems, such as convergent cross-mapping (CCM). We find that FCF, inferred via CCM, successfully predicts intervention effects, outperforming all information-based methods and it reveals a causal hierarchy between the array electrodes. We elucidate the computational features underlying FCF using ground truth data from recurrent neural network models, showing that FCF is robust to noise and common inputs. Our results provide the foundation for using targeted circuit manipulations to develop targeted interventions suitable for brain-machine interfaces and ameliorating cognitive dysfunctions in the human brain.

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