Alpha oscillations and traveling waves: Signatures of predictive coding?

Predictive coding is a key mechanism to understand the computational processes underlying brain functioning: in a hierarchical network, higher levels predict the activity of lower levels, and the unexplained residuals (i.e., prediction errors) are passed back to higher layers. Because of its recursi...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:PLoS biology 2019-10, Vol.17 (10), p.e3000487-e3000487
Main Authors: Alamia, Andrea, VanRullen, Rufin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Alpha Rhythm - physiology
Analysis
Biology and Life Sciences
Brain
Coding
Cognition & reasoning
Cognitive science
Cognitive Sciences
Communication
Computational neuroscience
Datasets as Topic
EEG
Electroencephalography
Feedback
Female
Fourier transforms
Humans
Level (quantity)
Levels
Life Sciences
Male
Medicine and Health Sciences
Model matching
Models, Neurological
Nerve Net - physiology
Neural coding
Neurons and Cognition
Neuroscience
Noise
Ordinary differential equations
Oscillations
Photic Stimulation
Physical Sciences
Physiological aspects
Predictions
Research and Analysis Methods
Rest - physiology
Sensory perception
Social Sciences
Traveling waves
Visual cortex
Visual Cortex - physiology
Visual stimuli
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Predictive coding is a key mechanism to understand the computational processes underlying brain functioning: in a hierarchical network, higher levels predict the activity of lower levels, and the unexplained residuals (i.e., prediction errors) are passed back to higher layers. Because of its recursive nature, we wondered whether predictive coding could be related to brain oscillatory dynamics. First, we show that a simple 2-level predictive coding model of visual cortex, with physiological communication delays between levels, naturally gives rise to alpha-band rhythms, similar to experimental observations. Then, we demonstrate that a multilevel version of the same model can explain the occurrence of oscillatory traveling waves across levels, both forward (during visual stimulation) and backward (during rest). Remarkably, the predictions of our model are matched by the analysis of 2 independent electroencephalography (EEG) datasets, in which we observed oscillatory traveling waves in both directions.
ISSN:1545-7885
1544-9173
1545-7885
DOI:10.1371/journal.pbio.3000487