Circuit dynamics in lobster stomatogastric ganglion based on winnerless competition network

The research of the circuit dynamics of the lobster stomatogastric ganglion (STG) inspires the understanding of the roles that regulates the rhythm of the lobster STG. In this paper, the lobster STG was analyzed by using Winnerless Competition (WLC) network. We got the rhythm of the gastric and pyloric circuits, which is similar to the experimental results, showing abundant firing modes especially the mixed-mode oscillations (MMOs). Firstly, we focused on the inhibitory loops in the STG which show the local dynamic properties of the system. The results show that the firing orders encode the information of these loops, and how the neurons’ spike numbers fluctuate with the change of an external stimulus acting on a neuron in the loops. Secondly, we researched the global dynamic properties of the STG. On the one hand, we discussed on the influence of the gap junction strength to firing results of the whole network. On the other hand, we showed that the WLC network of lobster STG has the potential to display chaos with a positive Lyapunov exponent.