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J Neurophysiol (April 14, 2004). doi:10.1152/jn.00062.2004
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Submitted on January 20, 2004
Accepted on April 6, 2004

Functional Stability of Dorsolateral Prefrontal Neurons

Paul A. Greenberg1* and Fraser A. W. Wilson1

1 Psychology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: pag{at}u.arizona.edu.

Greenberg, Paul A., Wilson, Fraser A.W. Functional Stability of Dorsolateral Prefrontal Neurons. Stable multi-day recordings from the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex of two monkeys performing two Go/NoGo visual discrimination tasks (one requiring well-learned responses, the other requiring learning) demonstrate that the majority of prefrontal neurons were "functionally stable". Recordings were made using a series of removable microdrives, each implanted for 3-6 months, housing independently mobile electrodes. Action potential waveforms of 94 neurons were stable over 2-9 days; 66/94 (70%) of these cells responded each day, 22/94 (23%) never responded significantly, and 6/94 (6%) responded one day but not the next. Of 66 responsive neurons, 55 were selective for either Go or NoGo trials, individual stimuli, or eye movements. This selectivity was functionally stable, i.e. maintained, for 46/55 neurons across all recording days. Functional stability was also noted in terms of response strength (baseline firing rates compared to post-stimulation firing rates) and event-related response timing. Two neurons with consistent responses in familiar testing conditions responded flexibly when the monkeys learned to make correct responses to novel stimuli. We conclude that the majority of prefrontal neurons were functionally stable during the performance of well-learned tasks. Such stability may be a general property of prefrontal neurons as neurons with 4 different types of task selectivity were found to be functionally stable. Conceptually similar studies based on long-term recordings in other cortical regions reached similar conclusions suggesting that neurons throughout the brain are functionally stable.




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