The potential for neuronal representations of external stimuli to be modified by previous experience is critical for efficient sensory processing and improved behavioral outcomes. To investigate how repeated exposure to a visual stimulus affects its representation in mouse primary visual cortex (V1), we performed two-photon calcium imaging of layer 2/3 neurons and assessed responses before, during, and after the presentation of a repetitive stimulus over 5 consecutive days. We found a stimulus-specific enhancement of the neuronal representation of the repetitively presented stimulus when it was associated with a reward. This was observed both after mice actively learned a rewarded task and when the reward was randomly received. Stimulus-specific enhanced representation resulted both from neurons gaining selectivity and from increased response reliability in previously selective neurons. In the absence of reward, there was either no change in stimulus representation or a decreased representation when the stimulus was viewed at a fixed temporal frequency. Pairing a second stimulus with a reward led to a similar enhanced representation and increased discriminability between the equally rewarded stimuli. Single-neuron responses showed that separate subpopulations discriminated between the two rewarded stimuli depending on whether the stimuli were displayed in a virtual environment or viewed on a single screen. We suggest that reward-associated responses enable the generalization of enhanced stimulus representation across these V1 subpopulations. We propose that this dynamic regulation of visual processing based on the behavioral relevance of sensory input ultimately enhances and stabilizes the representation of task-relevant features while suppressing responses to non-relevant stimuli.

中文翻译：

---

奖励关联增强初级视觉皮层中刺激特定的表示。

外部刺激的神经元表征被以前的经验修改的潜力对于有效的感觉处理和改善行为结果至关重要。为了研究反复暴露于视觉刺激如何影响其在小鼠初级视觉皮层 (V1) 中的表现，我们对第 2/3 层神经元进行了双光子钙成像，并评估了在重复刺激出现之前、期间和之后的反应。连续5天。我们发现，当重复呈现的刺激与奖励相关时，其神经元表征的刺激特异性增强。这是在小鼠主动学习奖励任务后和随机收到奖励时观察到的。刺激特异性增强表现是由于神经元获得选择性和先前选择性神经元的响应可靠性增加所致。在没有奖励的情况下，当以固定的时间频率查看刺激时，刺激表示没有变化或表示减少。将第二个刺激与奖励配对导致类似的增强表示和同等奖励刺激之间的可区分性增加。单神经元反应表明，根据刺激是在虚拟环境中显示还是在单个屏幕上查看，不同的亚群可以区分两种奖励刺激。我们建议与奖励相关的反应能够在这些 V1 亚群中推广增强的刺激表示。