TY - JOUR T1 - Grid-cell modules remain coordinated when neural activity is dissociated from external sensory cues JF - bioRxiv DO - 10.1101/2021.08.29.458100 SP - 2021.08.29.458100 AU - Torgeir Waaga AU - Haggai Agmon AU - Valentin A. Normand AU - Anne Nagelhus AU - Richard J. Gardner AU - May-Britt Moser AU - Edvard I. Moser AU - Yoram Burak Y1 - 2021/01/01 UR - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/08/29/2021.08.29.458100.abstract N2 - The representation of an animal’s position in the medial entorhinal cortex (MEC) is distributed across several modules of grid cells, each characterized by a distinct spatial scale. The population activity within each module is tightly coordinated and preserved across environments and behavioral states. Little is known, however, about the coordination of activity patterns across modules. We analyzed the joint activity patterns of hundreds of grid cells simultaneously recorded in animals that were foraging either in the light, when sensory cues could stabilize the representation, or in darkness, when such stabilization was disrupted. We found that the states of different grid modules are tightly coordinated, even in darkness, when the internal representation of position within the MEC deviates substantially from the true position of the animal. These findings suggest that internal brain mechanisms dynamically coordinate the representation of position in different modules, to ensure that grid cells jointly encode a coherent and smooth trajectory of the animal.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest. ER -