Internal representation and memory formation of odor preference based on oscillatory activities in a terrestrial slug

Abstract

The terrestrial slug Limax exhibits a highly developed ability to learn odors with a small nervous system. When a fluorescent dye, Lucifer Yellow (LY), is injected into the slug's body cavity after odor - taste associative conditioning, a group of neurons in the procerebral (PC) lobe, an olfactory center of the slug, is labeled by LY. We examined the relationships between conditioning strategies and LY labeling. The positions of LY-labeled neurons in the PC lobe after appetitive conditioning were more apical than those after aversive conditioning and did not depend on the conditioned odor, suggesting that the biological value of odors affected the position of LY-labeled neural clusters. A simple computational model consisting of two layers of oscillators with electrical synaptic interaction was constructed based on physiological features of the PC lobe, and showed that the oscillatory phase difference between the layers contributed to determination of the positions of LY-labeled neurons, suggesting that phase difference in oscillatory activity plays a role in the association of odors and the preference for them. © 2010 Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press.