PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Joana P. Neto
AU  - Gonçalo Lopes
AU  - João Frazão
AU  - Joana Nogueira
AU  - Pedro Lacerda
AU  - Pedro Baião
AU  - Arno Aarts
AU  - Alexandru Andrei
AU  - Silke Musa
AU  - Elvira Fortunato
AU  - Pedro Barquinha
AU  - Adam R. Kampff
TI  - “Validating silicon polytrodes with paired juxtacellular recordings: method and dataset”
AID  - 10.1101/037937
DP  - 2016 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 037937
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/01/26/037937.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/01/26/037937.full
AB  - Cross-validating new methods for recording neural activity is necessary to accurately interpret and compare the signals they measure. Here we describe a procedure for precisely aligning two probes for in vivo “paired-recordings” such that the spiking activity of a single neuron is monitored with both a dense extracellular silicon polytrode and a juxtacellular micro-pipette. Our new method allows for efficient, reliable, and automated guidance of both probes to the same neural structure with micron resolution. We also describe a new dataset of paired-recordings, which is available online. We propose that our novel targeting system, and ever expanding cross-validation dataset, will be vital to the development of new algorithms for automatically detecting/sorting single-units, characterizing new electrode materials/designs, and resolving nagging questions regarding the origin and nature of extracellular neural signals.