Noise induced oscillations in recurrent neural networks

It has been shown that oscillations can be generated by additive Gaussian white noise in a recurrent Hodgkin-Huxley neuron model. Type 1 oscillation was induced with stochastic resonance (SR) by additive Gaussian noise at lower amplitudes, while Type 2 oscillation was observed at higher amplitudes. However, the mechanism of Type 2 oscillation is not clear. In this article, we test the hypothesis through computer simulations that the period of the Type 2 oscillation can be affected by temperature in a recurrent neural network in which the recurrent model is constructed by four Hodgkin-Huxley (HH) neuron models. Each HH neuron model is driven by Gaussian noise and sub-threshold excitatory synaptic currents with an alpha function from another HH neuron model, and the action potentials (spike firings) of each HH neuron model are transferred to the other HH neuron model via sub-threshold synaptic currents. From spike firing times recorded, the inter spike interval (ISI) histogram was generated, and the periodicity of spike firings was detected from the ISI histogram at each HH neuron model. The results show that the probability of spike firings in the Type1 oscillation is maximized at a specific standard deviation (S.D.) of the Gaussian white noise with SR at 6.3, 15.0 and 25.0degC, while the period of the Type 2 oscillation depends on temperature. It is concluded that the Type1 oscillation can be induced by additive Gaussian white noise on the basis of a synaptic delay in the recurrent HH neuron model, whereas ISIs of the Type 2 oscillation may be determined by refractory periods of HH neuron models.