Dmitry Rinberg

Wednesday 8th May 2019

Time:4.00pm

Ground Floor Seminar Room

25 Howland Street, London, W1T 4JG

Primacy coding model and the structure of the olfactory space

Understanding sensory processing relies on establishing a consistent relationship between the stimulus space, its neural representation, and perceptual quality. In olfaction, the difficulty in establishing these links lies partly in the complexity of the underlying odor input space and perceptual responses. Here, I first describe a primacy coding model for concentration invariant odor identity representation. Then, I present a novel theoretical framework for mapping the odor input space to the response properties of olfactory receptors based on this model and a few simple assumptions. I will analyze a geometrical structure containing odor representations in a multidimensional space of receptor affinities and describe its low dimensional implementation. I will further discuss implications for the anatomical organization of the early olfactory network.