Using spike train distances to identify the most discriminative neuronal subpopulation

During the last decade spike train distances [1-4] have become an essential means to characterize neural coding in a wide range of neurophysiological contexts. In a typical setup different stimuli are presented repeatedly and spike train distances are used to carry out a pairwise similarity analysis in order to evaluate whether responses to the same stimulus exhibit smaller distances than responses to different stimuli. With the increasing availability of multi-neuron recordings these kinds of analyses can now be performed not just for individual neurons but rather for simultaneously recorded neuronal populations. ... ...