Temporal coding of reward-guided choice in the posterior parietal cortex

Abstract

A central question in systems neuroscience is how cognitive functions can arise from the interplay of many different brain areas. For example the cognitive act of forming a decision requires a concerted computation involving sensory, mnemonic, and executive information residing in neural circuits that have different anatomical locations, that operate on different temporal scales, and that extend over different spatial dimensions. We find that in a central cortical hub—the posterior parietal cortex—firing rate information about upcoming decisions is pulsed according to intrinsic temporal structure in the beta- and gamma-frequency ranges. The brain may use temporal structure at several time scales to support distributed computations that underlie reward-guided decisions.

Document Details

Document Type
Pub Defense Publication
Publication Date
Nov 07, 2016
Source ID
10.1073/pnas.1606479113

Entities

People

  • Bijan Pesaran
  • David J. Hawellek
  • Yan T. Wong

Organizations

  • National Eye Institute
  • New York University
  • Simons Foundation
  • University of Melbourne

Tags

Fields of Study

  • Biology
  • Psychology

Readers

  • Neuroscience
  • Systems Analysis and Design