Lateral Propagation from Sensory Cortex Provides Differential Gain for Sensory Selection

Target (Go) whisker stimuli in mice drive substantially greater lateral propagation beyond center response fields than distractor (NoGo) stimuli, with expert activity matching traveling cortical waves in infragranular layers.

• Why it matters: Sensory selection in neocortex is linked to enhanced target responses, but how gain is generated—especially via lateral spread beyond the center field—remains unclear.
• What they did: Mice performed a whisker-based selective detection task while activity was tracked for lateral propagation; frontal cortex suppression of distractor responses was tested, and computational modeling examined lateral excitation modulation.
• The result: Target-evoked propagation increased with task learning, and frontal cortex suppressed both center and lateral recruitment for distractors; modeling reproduced key experimental features, supporting lateral propagation regulation for differential sensory amplification.