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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2021 Oct 1.
Published in final edited form as: Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2019 Dec 14;64:10–16. doi: 10.1016/j.conb.2019.11.017

Figure 3. Hypothesized circuit and synaptic mechanisms of integration.

Figure 3.

(A) Cross-modal suppression through reciprocal inhibition. Networks driving feeding and locomotion are linked by mutual inhibition (barred connections). Sensory input that drives feeding (tastant, blue) or locomotion (odor, orange) evokes winner-take-all dynamics.

(B) Summation through convergent sensory input. Neurons carrying visual (purple) and wind (green) information both make excitatory synapses (arrows) onto a neuron that controls orientation (gray).

(C) Gating through presynaptic inhibition. Wind signals (green) provide input to a neuron that controls orientation (gray). Odor information (orange) presynaptically shunts wind input to the orientation control neuron through an inhibitory connection (bar).

(D) Cross-modal association through modulation. The simultaneous presentation of noxious heat (red) and a visual stimulus strengthens the synapse from the visual input neuron onto the orientation control neuron through release of a neuromodulator from the heat-sensitive neuron (circle). Subsequent presentations of the visual stimulus alone are sufficient to drive activity in the orientation control cell. Inset shows the strength (w) of the synapse before and after pairing.