An oscillatory interference model of grid cell firing

We expand upon our proposal that the oscillatory interference mechanism proposed for the phase precession effect in place cells underlies the grid-like firing pattern of dorsomedial entorhinal grid cells (O'Keefe and Burgess (2005) Hippocampus 15:853-866). The original one-dimensional interference model is generalized to an appropriate two-dimensional mechanism. Specifically, dendritic subunits of layer II medial entorhinal stellate cells provide multiple linear interference patterns along different directions, with their product determining the firing of the cell. Connection of appropriate speed- and direction-dependent inputs onto dendritic subunits could result from an unsupervised learning rule which…