The role of gain neuromodulation in layer-5 pyramidal neurons

Abstract

Biological and artificial learning systems alike confront the plasticity-stability dilemma. In the brain, neuromodulators such as acetylcholine and noradrenaline relieve this tension by tuning neuronal gain and inhibitory gating, balancing segregation and integration of circuits. Fed by dense cholinergic and noradrenergic projections from the ascending arousal system, layer-5 pyramidal neurons in the cerebral cortex offer a relevant substrate for understanding these dynamics. When distal dendritic signals coincide with back-propagating action potentials, calcium plateaus turn a single somatic spike into a high-gain burst, and interneuron inhibition sculpts the output. These properties make layer-5 cells gain-tunable amplifiers that translate neuromodulatory cues into flexible cortical activity. To capture this mechanism we developed a two-compartment Izhikevich model for pyramidal neurons and single-compartment somatostatin (SOM) and parvalbumin (PV) interneurons, linked by Gaussian connectivity and spike-timing-dependent plasticity (STDP). The soma and apical dendrite are so coupled that somatic spikes back-propagate, while dendritic plateaus can switch the soma from regular firing to bursting by shifting reset and adaptation variables. We show that stronger dendritic drive or tighter coupling raise gain by increasing the likelihood of calcium-triggered somatic bursts. In contrast, dendritic-targeted inhibition suppresses gain, while somatic-targeted inhibition raises the firing threshold of neighboring neurons, thus gating neurons output. Notably, bursting accelerates STDP, supporting rapid synaptic reconfiguration and flexibility. This suggests that brief gain pulses driven by neuromodulators could serve as an adaptive two-timescale optimization mechanism, effectively modulating the synaptic weight updates.