Characterization of laminar activity patterns in cat visual cortex

Local cell populations across the different layers of a cortical column display characteristic activity patterns during spontaneous activity and in response to visual stimulation. I will discuss different measures to analyze simultaneously recorded spike trains and illustrate their utility to understand data from anesthetized cats. Characterizations based on individual spike trains quantify fundamental properties such as regularity or selectivity with respect to the direction of motion. However, to capture how local populations in the different layers process and transmit sensory information, their joint response statistics are required. I will present results describing statistical dependencies between the responses of multiple cells during spontaneous activity and during stimulation with drifting gratings and natural movie scenes.