• A Y Y Tan, S Andoni, and N J Priebe.
• Center for Perceptual Systems, Section of Neurobiology, School of Biological Sciences, College of Natural Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin, 2400 Speedway, Austin, TX 78705, USA. atyy@alum.mit.edu
• Neuroscience. 2013 Sep 5;247:364-75.

AbstractCortical spontaneous activity reflects an animal's behavioral state and affects neural responses to sensory stimuli. The correlation between excitatory and inhibitory synaptic input to single neurons is a key parameter in models of cortical circuitry. Recent measurements demonstrated highly correlated synaptic excitation and inhibition during spontaneous "up-and-down" states, during which excitation accounted for approximately 80% of inhibitory variance (Shu et al., 2003; Haider et al., 2006). Here we report in vivo whole-cell estimates of the correlation between excitation and inhibition in the rat visual cortex under pentobarbital anesthesia, during which up-and-down states are absent. Excitation and inhibition are weakly correlated, relative to the up-and-down state: excitation accounts for less than 40% of inhibitory variance. Although these correlations are lower than when the circuit cycles between up-and-down states, both behaviors may arise from the same circuitry. Our observations provide evidence that different correlational patterns of excitation and inhibition underlie different cortical states.Copyright © 2013 IBRO. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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