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Neurons learn by predicting future activity

Artur Luczak, Yoshimasa Kubo
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.25.314211
Artur Luczak
Canadian Center for Behavioural Neuroscience; University of Lethbridge, AB, Canada
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  • For correspondence: Luczak@uleth.ca
Yoshimasa Kubo
Canadian Center for Behavioural Neuroscience; University of Lethbridge, AB, Canada
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Abstract

The brain is using a learning algorithm which is yet to be discovered. Here we demonstrate that the ability of a neuron to predict its expected future activity may be an important missing component to understand learning in the brain. We show that comparing predicted activity with the actual activity can provide an error signal for modifying synaptic weights. Importantly, this learning rule can be derived from minimizing neuron metabolic cost. This reveals an unexpected connection, that learning in neural networks could result from simply maximizing energy balance by each neuron. We validated this predictive learning rule in neural network simulations and in data recorded from awake animals. We found that neurons in the sensory cortex can indeed predict their activity ~10-20ms in the future. Moreover, in response to stimuli, cortical neurons changed their firing rate to minimize surprise: i.e. the difference between actual and expected activity, as predicted by our model. Our results also suggest that spontaneous brain activity provides “training data” for neurons to learn to predict cortical dynamics. Thus, this work demonstrates that the ability of a neuron to predict its future inputs could be an important missing element to understand computation in the brain.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Footnotes

  • https://github.com/ykubo82/bioCHL

Copyright 
The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.
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Posted September 28, 2020.
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Neurons learn by predicting future activity
Artur Luczak, Yoshimasa Kubo
bioRxiv 2020.09.25.314211; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.25.314211
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Neurons learn by predicting future activity
Artur Luczak, Yoshimasa Kubo
bioRxiv 2020.09.25.314211; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.25.314211

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