Topic: analog communication

The vast majority of neurons in the vertebrate nervous systems transmits information in a digital manner via action potentials. Yet, a detailed understanding of the advantages of digital communication in the brain is still lacking. In our study, we investigate synaptic transmission in terms of an optimization problem, where the space of solutions comprises the digital and the analog regime. We analyze a binomial synapse model connecting two neurons, where the probability of transmitter release, modeled by a transfer function, depends on the axonal membrane potential. We optimize the transfer f