Concentration-Invariant Odor Representation in the Olfactory System by Presynaptic Inhibition

The present study investigates a network model for implementing concentration-invariant representation for odors in the olfactory system. The network consists of olfactory receptor neurons, projection neurons, and inhibitory local neurons. Receptor neurons send excitatory inputs to projection neurons, which are modulated by the inhibitory inputs from local neurons. The modulation occurs at the presynaptic site from a receptor neuron to a projection one, leading to the operation of divisive normalization. The responses of local interneurons are determined by the total activities of olfactory receptor neurons. We find that with a proper parameter condition, the responses of projection neurons become effectively independent of the odor concentration. Simulation results confirm our theoretical analysis.