Cortex

Question 1

What are the 3 main areas of the auditory cortex?

Answer 1

The auditory cortex is divided into three main areas: the core, the belt, surrounding the core, and the parabelt, adjacent to the belt.

Question 2

How many layers does the auditory cortex have? Is this the same or different as other cortical sensory processing centers?

Answer 2

There are six layers to the auditory cortex: I- cell poor, II- small pyramidal cells, III- large pyramidal and fusiforms, IV- stellates and pyramidals, V- two parts, cell sparse and dense, and VI- pyramidals with a complex arrangement. Yes, they are the same as other cortical sensory processing centers.

Question 3

MGB projects mainly to what layer of the auditory cortex?

Answer 3

MGB projects to layers three and four of the auditory cortex.

Question 4

xplain the neural connections in layer IV.

Answer 4

Organized in vertical columns and have direct soma to soma connections.

Question 5

Explain the tonotopic organization of A1 and A2.

Answer 5

In A1, some cells are sharply tuned to a CF, tonotopic organization, and iso-frequency strips.

In AII, poor tonotopocity and cells in same region can have various CFs.

Question 6

What are two things that make measuring response properties and classification very difficult in A1.

Answer 6

Response properties change a lot.
There are certain firing patterns in some cases. Then you change the state of the system and the firing pattern changes again.

Question 7

Design a neuron with convergent inputs that has improved tuning.

Answer 7

Neurons 1 and 3 inhibit 4
Neuron 2 excites 4, so 4 is tuned to same frequency as 2
With the introduction of inhibition, the nonmonotonic rate level functions are developed and the tuning curves are more narrowly tuned.