Cell-specific restoration of stimulus preference after monocular deprivation in the visual cortex

Abstract

Ocular dominance plasticity reconsidered How neuronal circuits are established and reformed during development and learning is unclear. One idea is that cortical circuits have virtually unlimited plasticity and are rebuilt routinely from random components. An alternative view is that some of these connections are more or less preformed and rigid. Working in mice, Rose et al. looked at how visual cortical neurons change their response after monocular deprivation. After recovery, the response properties of the neurons returned to their pre-deprivation pattern. Thus, it is not the strong connectivity backbone but perhaps inhibitory and weaker connections that are changed temporarily during sensory deprivation, whereas a core circuitry returns to default mode even after several days of altered activity. Science , this issue p. 1319