16.06.2016: Tobias Rose

Title: "Cell-specific restoration of stimulus preference after monocular deprivation in visual cortex"

Abstract:
Monocular deprivation (MD) evokes a prominent shift of neuronal responses in the visual cortex towards the open eye, accompanied by functional and structural synaptic rearrangements. This shift is reversible, but it is unknown whether the recovery happens at the level of individual neurons or whether it reflects a population effect. We used ratiometric Ca2+ imaging to follow the activity of the same excitatory layer 2/3 neurons in mouse visual cortex over months during repeated episodes of ocular dominance (OD) plasticity. We observed robust shifts towards the open eye in most neurons. Nevertheless, these cells faithfully returned to their pre-deprivation OD during binocular recovery. Moreover, the initial network correlation structure was largely recovered, suggesting that functional connectivity may be regained despite prominent experience-dependent plasticity.