A realistic morpho-anatomical connection strategy for modelling full-scale point-neuron microcircuits


Date

2022-08-16

Publication Type

Journal Article

ETH Bibliography

yes

Citations

Altmetric

Data

Abstract

The modeling of extended microcircuits is emerging as an effective tool to simulate the neurophysiological correlates of brain activity and to investigate brain dysfunctions. However, for specific networks, a realistic modeling approach based on the combination of available physiological, morphological and anatomical data is still an open issue. One of the main problems in the generation of realistic networks lies in the strategy adopted to build network connectivity. Here we propose a method to implement a neuronal network at single cell resolution by using the geometrical probability volumes associated with pre- and postsynaptic neurites. This allows us to build a network with plausible connectivity properties without the explicit use of computationally intensive touch detection algorithms using full 3D neuron reconstructions. The method has been benchmarked for the mouse hippocampus CA1 area, and the results show that this approach is able to generate full-scale brain networks at single cell resolution that are in good agreement with experimental findings. This geometric reconstruction of axonal and dendritic occupancy, by effectively reflecting morphological and anatomical constraints, could be integrated into structured simulators generating entire circuits of different brain areas facilitating the simulation of different brain regions with realistic models.

Publication status

published

Editor

Book title

Volume

12 (1)

Pages / Article No.

13864

Publisher

Macmillan Publishers

Event

Edition / version

Methods

Software

Geographic location

Date collected

Date created

Subject

Organisational unit

Notes

Funding

945539 - Human Brain Project Specific Grant Agreement 3 (EC)

Related publications and datasets