A neural circuit architecture for rapid learning in goal-directed navigation

May 25, 2024Neuron

A brain circuit for fast learning in goal-directed navigation

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Abstract

Drosophila use internal representations of head direction to build goal representations in a learning task.

Flies express heading preferences through randomly generated fixations and directed saccades.
Head direction neurons are necessary for modifying heading preferences based on reinforcement.
The interaction between head direction and goal representations can influence fly behavior.
Rapid learning of new goal headings may rely on a flexible behavioral policy with a genetically encoded structure.
The findings suggest that these adaptive behaviors driven by internal representations could be relevant across different species.

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Anchoring goals to spatial representations enables flexible navigation but is challenging in novel environments when both representations must be acquired simultaneously. We propose a framework for how Drosophila uses internal representations of head direction (HD) to build goal representations upon selective thermal reinforcement. We show that flies use stochastically generated fixations and directed saccades to express heading preferences in an operant visual learning paradigm and that HD neurons are required to modify these preferences based on reinforcement. We used a symmetric visual setting to expose how flies' HD and goal representations co-evolve and how the reliability of these interacting representations impacts behavior. Finally, we describe how rapid learning of new goal headings may rest on a behavioral policy whose parameters are flexible but whose form is genetically encoded in circuit architecture. Such evolutionarily structured architectures, which enable rapidly adaptive behavior driven by internal representations, may be relevant across species.

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