Related papers: Convexity of Neural Codes with Four Maximal Codewo…
We study the open, closed, and non-degenerate embedding dimensions of neural codes, which are the smallest respective dimensions in which one can find a realization of a code consisting of convex sets that are open, closed, or…
Place cells in the hippocampus are active when an animal visits a certain location (referred to as a place field) within an environment. Grid cells in the medial entorhinal cortex (MEC) respond at multiple locations, with firing fields that…
Convex neural codes are combinatorial structures describing the intersection pattern of a collection of convex sets. Inductively pierced codes are a particularly nice subclass of neural codes introduced in the information visualization…
An appealing new principle for neural population codes is that correlations among neurons organize neural activity patterns into a discrete set of clusters, which can each be viewed as a noise-robust population "codeword". Previous studies…
This dissertation explores applications of discrete geometry in mathematical neuroscience. We begin with convex neural codes, which model the activity of hippocampal place cells and other neurons with convex receptive fields. In Chapter 4,…
Encoding information about continuous variables using noisy computational units is a challenge; nonetheless, asymptotic theory shows that combining multiple periodic scales for coding can be highly precise despite the corrupting influence…
In this paper, we investigate a constrained formulation of neural networks where the output is a convex function of the input. We show that the convexity constraints can be enforced on both fully connected and convolutional layers, making…
Neural codes are binary codes in $\{0,1\}^n$; here we focus on the ones which represent the firing patterns of a type of neurons called place cells. There is much interest in determining which neural codes can be realized by a collection of…
Networks of neurons in the brain encode preferred patterns of neural activity via their synaptic connections. Despite receiving considerable attention, the precise relationship between network connectivity and encoded patterns is still…
We define a notion of morphism between combinatorial codes, making the class of all combinatorial codes into a category $\mathbf{Code}$. We show that morphisms can be used to remove redundant information from a code, and that morphisms…
Learning to read places a strong challenge on the visual system. Years of expertise lead to a remarkable capacity to separate highly similar letters and encode their relative positions, thus distinguishing words such as FORM and FROM,…
Motivated by a wide-spread use of convex optimization techniques, convexity properties of bit error rate of the maximum likelihood detector operating in the AWGN channel are studied for arbitrary constellations and bit mappings, which also…
Neural language models process sequences of words, but the mathematical operations inside them are insensitive to the order in which words appear. Positional encodings are the component added to remedy this. Despite their importance,…
It has been studied by Curto et al. (SIAM J. on App. Alg. and Geom., 1(1) : 222 $\unicode{x2013}$ 238, 2017) that a neural code that has an open convex realization does not have any local obstruction relative to the neural code. Further, a…
We describe the combinatorics of equilibria and steady states of neurons in threshold-linear networks that satisfy Dale's law. The combinatorial code of a Dale network is characterized in terms of two conditions: (i) a condition on the…
Grid cells in the entorhinal cortex encode the position of an animal in its environment using spatially periodic tuning curves of varying periodicity. Recent experiments established that these cells are functionally organized in discrete…
Grid cells in the brain respond when an animal occupies a periodic lattice of "grid fields" during spatial navigation. The grid scale varies along the dorso-ventral axis of the entorhinal cortex. We propose that the grid system minimizes…
Detailed knowledge of mechanical parameters such as cell elasticity, stiffness of the growth substrate, or traction stresses generated during axonal extensions is essential for understanding the mechanisms that control neuronal growth. Here…
A neural code $\mathcal{C}$ is a collection of binary vectors of a given length n that record the co-firing patterns of a set of neurons. Our focus is on neural codes arising from place cells, neurons that respond to geographic stimulus. In…
Spatial coupling has recently emerged as a powerful paradigm to construct graphical models that work well under low-complexity message-passing algorithms. Although much progress has been made on the analysis of spatially coupled models…