Reinforcement Learning Recruits Somata and Apical Dendrites across Layers of Primary Sensory Cortex (Cell Reports)

Previously, the only known triggers of apical dendritic spikes were `bottom-up` events, such as appropriate sensory stimuli or an animal`s location in space. Lacefield et al. show that reinforced associations are powerful triggers of apical dendrite activity and that reward can manipulate perceptions at their earliest stages of cortical processing.