Parameter and coupling estimation in small networks of Izhikevich's neurons.

Nowadays, experimental techniques allow scientists to have access to large amounts of data. In order to obtain reliable information from the complex systems that produce these data, appropriate analysis tools are needed. The Kalman filter is a frequently used technique to infer, assuming a model of the system, the parameters of the model from uncertain observations. A well-known implementation of the Kalman filter, the unscented Kalman filter (UKF), was recently shown to be able to infer the connectivity of a set of coupled chaotic oscillators. In this work, we test whether the UKF can also reconstruct the connectivity of small groups of coupled neurons when their links are either electrical or chemical synapses. In particular, we consider Izhikevich neurons and aim to infer which neurons influence each other, considering simulated spike trains as the experimental observations used by the UKF. First, we verify that the UKF can recover the parameters of a single neuron, even when the parameters vary in time. Second, we analyze small neural ensembles and demonstrate that the UKF allows inferring the connectivity between the neurons, even for heterogeneous, directed, and temporally evolving networks. Our results show that time-dependent parameter and coupling estimation is possible in this nonlinearly coupled system.

Chimera states in a neuronal network under the action of an electric field.

The phenomenon of the chimera state symbolizes the coexistence of coherent and incoherent sections of a given population. This phenomenon identified in several physical and biological systems presents several variants, including the multichimera states and the traveling chimera state. Here, we numerically study the influence of a weak external electric field on the dynamics of a network of Hindmarsh-Rose (HR) neurons coupled locally by an electrical interaction and nonlocally by a chemical one. We first focus on the phenomena of traveling chimera states and multicluster oscillating breathers that appear in the electric field's absence. Then in the field's presence, we highlight the presence of a chimera state, a multichimera state, an alternating chimera state, and a multicluster traveling chimera.