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Summary: TRENDS in Cognitive Sciences Vol.6 No.4 April 2002
http://tics.trends.com 1364-6613/02/$ see front matter © 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd.All rights reserved. PII: S1364-6613(02)01886-7
147Research Update
Research News
From synaptic errors to thalamocortical circuitry
Terry Elliott
Recent data indicate that newly grown
synapses in the brain are not guaranteed to
innervate their desired target, but can form
instead on nearby targets. Such `errors'
introduce representational inaccuracies
but improve representational flexibility.
Optimizing accuracy and flexibility requires
detecting correlated activity and disabling
plasticity, explaining the structure of the
thalamocortical circuit.
How does the brain learn from
experience? How does it maintain the
integrity of learned experiences while
retaining the capacity to learn new ones?
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