SENSORY GATING EVOKED BY PAW-REACHES IN MICE

The brain is assumed to contain predictive systems that modify sensory flow during movement. Sensory gating (SG) is a candidate mechanism providing corticofugal attenuation of ascending sensory signals, before and during movement. However, its behavioral role remains poorly understood. Specifically, it remains unclear, whether and how SG relates to the classical concept of state estimation, the modern formalization of the reafference principle. The latter is likely under the control of the cerebellum, and is a learned suppression of sensory signals precisely at the time of expected sensory consequences.
To approach these questions, we trained head-fixed mice on a paw-reach task , which allowed manipulation of tactile feedback delays, presented at the paw’s palm, while recording ascending tactile signals in primary somatosensory cortex. We found robust SG attenuation across a broad range of arbitrarily presented sensory delays. However, there was a consistent temporal profile of modulation across movement time. An additional and separable attenuation could be induced by training the mice on highly predicable time-locked tactile feedback, as expected from the properties of state estimation. Together, these findings suggest that SG operates over an extended temporal window distinct from, and broader in temporal scope than classical state estimation.