title: Event- and time-dependent decline of outcome information in the primate prefrontal cortex.
abstract: The prefrontal cortex (PF) is involved in outcome-based flexible adaptation in a dynamically changing environment. The outcome signal dissipates gradually over time, but the temporal dynamics of this dissipation remains unknown. To examine this issue, we analyzed the outcome-related activity of PF neurons in 2 monkeys in a distance discrimination task. The initial prestimulus period of this task varied in duration, allowing us to dissociate the effects of time and event on the decline in previous outcome-related activity -previous correct versus previous error. We observed 2 types of decline in previous outcome representation: PF neurons that ceased to encode the previous outcome as time passed (time-dependent) and neurons that maintained their signal but it decreased rapidly after the occurrence of a new external event (event-dependent). Although the time-dependent dynamics explained the decline in a greater proportion of neurons, the event-dependent decline was also observed in a significant population of neurons.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Encarni
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Marcos
authors.affiliation: Department of Intelligence Science and Technology, Graduate School of Informatics, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan.|Nielsen Consumer Neuroscience, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Satoshi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tsujimoto
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Aldo
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Genovesio
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D004215:Distance Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D008253:Macaca mulatta; D008297:Male; D009474:Neurons / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D013997:Time Factors