Attentional flexibility is impaired in the absense of BA inhibitory interneurons. J. JohnYohan ZikopoulosBasilis BullockDaniel BarbasHelen 2016 <p>Axis and subplot labels are as in <a href="http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004722#pcbi.1004722.g005" target="_blank">Fig 5</a>. <b><i>A</i>,</b> Plan map. <b><i>B</i>, <i>C</i>,</b> Salience map. The BA interneurons are ‘lesioned’ in the simulation. <b><i>D</i>, <i>E</i>, <i>F</i>,</b> Sensory map, including sensory cortex (D), sensory TRN sector (E) and sensory thalamus (F). <b><i>G</i>,</b> Input to sensory thalamus (stimuli and distractors). <b><i>H</i>,</b> Reinforcement signals and Conditioned Stimuli (CSs). During the second testing phase (to the right of the vertical dotted line) top-down bias is applied to the feed plan. The plans (A) shift as in the previous simulations, but within the periods when the feed plan (blue plot) is active, sensory attention (D) does not shift between the two relevant stimuli, CS1 and CS2. Attentional flexibility of the system is thus degraded in the absense of inhibition onto the BA neurons (triggered by stimulus-specific expectation violation). During the first testing phase, the rate at which the plan shifts from feed to fear is dependent on the rate of build-up of the cortical expectation violation signal. A slow build-up is employed, as in <a href="http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004722#pcbi.1004722.g003" target="_blank">Fig 3</a>. (In this simulation <i>M</i><sub><i>1</i></sub> = 160 during the second testing phase).</p>