Ravikrishnan P. Jayakumar

We assessed whether firing patterns of place cells and HD cells exhibited competing influences of landmark and path-integration cues during periods of sustained cue conflict (epochs 2 and 3).

Abstract Theta oscillation is considered a temporal scaffold for hippocampal computations that organizes the activity of spatially tuned cells known as place cells. Late phases of theta support prospective spatial representation via phase ‘precession’. In contrast, some studies have hypothesized that early phases of theta may subserve both retrospective spatial representation via phase ‘procession’ and the encoding of new associations.

Abstract Hippocampal place cells are influenced by both self-motion (idiothetic) signals and external sensory landmarks as an animal navigates its environment. To continuously update a position signal on an internal ‘cognitive map’, the hippocampal system integrates self-motion signals over time, a process that relies on a finely calibrated path integration gain that relates movement in physical space to movement on the cognitive map.