Abstract—The functional importance of lateral inhibition in neural processing has been well documented, but the detailed mechanism is still hotly debated. In previous studies, we showed that lateral inhibition serves to decrease firing rates in neurons to the level corresponding to the best representation of stimuli. To further validate this hypothesis, we examine whether a sparse coding model is compatible with the response properties of cortical neurons, including orientation selectivity, cross orientation suppression and surround suppression. Simulation results demonstrate that the model can explain conflicting conclusions drawn from physiological experiments and give new insight into topological structure and information processing in the visual cortex.

Index Terms—sparse coding, lateral inhibition, orientation selectivity, cross orientation suppression, surround suppression

Cite: Liping Xiao and Jiqian Liu, "Lateral Inhibition Underlying Suppression of Neuronal Activity and Sparse Coding," Journal of Image and Graphics, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 144-148, December 2015. doi: 10.18178/joig.3.2.144-148