TY - JOUR
T1 - Non-overlapping sets of neurons encode behavioral response determinants across different tasks in the posterior medial prefrontal cortex
AU - Awan, Muhammad Ali Haider
AU - Mushiake, Hajime
AU - Matsuzaka, Yoshiya
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported by grants to YM [Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (KAKENHI) 17K07060 and 21K07263] and HM (JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 19H03337, MEXT KAKENHI Grant Number JP16H06276: Platform of Advanced Animal Model Support, and JST RISTEX Grant Number JPMJRX21K5, Japan).
Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © 2023 Awan, Mushiake and Matsuzaka.
PY - 2023/2/9
Y1 - 2023/2/9
N2 - Higher mammals are able to simultaneously learn and perform a wide array of complex behaviors, which raises questions about how the neural representations of multiple tasks coexist within the same neural network. Do neurons play invariant roles across different tasks? Alternatively, do the same neurons play different roles in different tasks? To address these questions, we examined neuronal activity in the posterior medial prefrontal cortex of primates while they were performing two versions of arm-reaching tasks that required the selection of multiple behavioral tactics (i.e., the internal protocol of action selection), a critical requirement for the activation of this area. During the performance of these tasks, neurons in the pmPFC exhibited selective activity for the tactics, visuospatial information, action, or their combination. Surprisingly, in 82% of the tactics-selective neurons, the selective activity appeared in a particular task but not in both. Such task-specific neuronal representation appeared in 72% of the action-selective neurons. In addition, 95% of the neurons representing visuospatial information showed such activity exclusively in one task but not in both. Our findings indicate that the same neurons can play different roles across different tasks even though the tasks require common information, supporting the latter hypothesis.
AB - Higher mammals are able to simultaneously learn and perform a wide array of complex behaviors, which raises questions about how the neural representations of multiple tasks coexist within the same neural network. Do neurons play invariant roles across different tasks? Alternatively, do the same neurons play different roles in different tasks? To address these questions, we examined neuronal activity in the posterior medial prefrontal cortex of primates while they were performing two versions of arm-reaching tasks that required the selection of multiple behavioral tactics (i.e., the internal protocol of action selection), a critical requirement for the activation of this area. During the performance of these tasks, neurons in the pmPFC exhibited selective activity for the tactics, visuospatial information, action, or their combination. Surprisingly, in 82% of the tactics-selective neurons, the selective activity appeared in a particular task but not in both. Such task-specific neuronal representation appeared in 72% of the action-selective neurons. In addition, 95% of the neurons representing visuospatial information showed such activity exclusively in one task but not in both. Our findings indicate that the same neurons can play different roles across different tasks even though the tasks require common information, supporting the latter hypothesis.
KW - behavioral tactics
KW - monkey
KW - neuron
KW - posterior medial prefrontal cortex
KW - task-dependent encoding
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U2 - 10.3389/fnsys.2023.1049062
DO - 10.3389/fnsys.2023.1049062
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85148629178
SN - 1662-5137
VL - 17
JO - Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience
JF - Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience
M1 - 1049062
ER -